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► . SpKCIAI. PRICK 15 CkN rS. 




The Seaside Library. 

POCKET EDITION. 


NO. PRICE. 

1 Yolande. By William Black '20 

2 Molly Bawn. By “ The Duchess ” — 20 

3 The Mill on the Floss. By George Eliot 20 

4 Under Two Flags. By “ Ouida ” 20 

5 Admiral’s Ward. By Mrs. Alexander.. 20 

6 Portia. By “ The Duchess ” 20 

7 B’ile No. 113. By Emile Gaboriau 20 

8 East Lynne. By Mrs. Henry Wood. ... 20 

9 Wanda. By “ Ouida ” 20 

10 The Old Curiosity Shop. By Dickens. 20 

11 JohnHalifax, Gentleman. Miss Mulock 20 

12 Other People’s Money. By Gaboriau. 20 

13 Eyre’s Acquittal. By Helen B. Mathers 10 

14 Airy Fairy Lilian. By “The Duchess” 10 


15 Jane Eyre. By Charlotte Bront6 20 

16 Phyllis. By “ The Duchess ” 20 

17 The Wooing O’t. By Mrs. Alexander.. 20 

18 Shandon Bells. By William Black 20 

19 Her Mother’s Sin. By the Author of 

“ Dora Thorne ” 10 

20 Within an Inch of His Life. By Emile 

Gaboriau 20 

21 Sunrise. By William Black 20 


22 David Copperfleld. Dickens. Vol. I.. 20 

22 David Copperfleld. Dickens. Vol. H. 20 

23 A Princess of Thule. By William Black 20 

24 Pickwick Papers. Dickens. Vol. I... 20 

24 Pickwick Papers. Dickens. Vol. II.. 20 

25 Mrs. Geoffrey. By “ The Duchess ”... 20 

26 Monsieur Lecoq. By Gaboriau. Vol. I. 20 

26 Monsieur Lecoq. By Gaboriau. Vol. H. 20 

27 Vanity Fair. By William M. Thackeray 20 

^ Ivanhoe. By Sir Walter Scott 20 

29 Beauty’s Daughters. “ The Duchess ” 10 

30 Faith and Unfaith. By “ The Duchess ” 20 

31 Middlemarch. By George Eliot 20 

32 The Land Leaguers. Anthony Trollope 20 

33 TheCliqmeofGold. By Emile Gaboriau 10 

34 Daniel Deronda. By George Eliot ... 30 

35 Lady Audley’s Secret. Miss Braddon 20 


36 Adam Bede. By George Eliot 20 

37 Nicholas Nickleby. By Charles Dickens 30 

38 The Widow Lerouge By Gaboriau. . 20 

39 In Silk Attire. By William Black 20 

40 The Last Days of Pompeii. By Sir E. 

Bulwer Lytton 20 

41 Oliver Twist. By Charles Dickens ... . 20 

42 Romola. By George Eliot 20 


43 The Mystery of Orcival. Gaboriau 20 

44 Macleod of Dare. By William Black. . 20 

45 A Little Pilgrim. By Mrs. Oliphant. . . 10 

46 Very Hard Cash. By Charles Reade. . 20 

47 Altiora Peto. By Laurence Oliphant.. 20 

48 q'hicker Than Water. By James Payn. 20 

49 That Beautiful Wretch. By Black... 20 

50 The Strange Adventures of a Phaeton. 


By William Black 20 

51 Dora Thorne. By the Author of “ Her 

Mother’s Sin” 20 

52 The New Magdalen. By Wilkie Collins. 10 

53 The Story of Ida. By Francesca 10 

54 .A Broken Wedding-Ring. By the Au- 

thor of “ Dora Thorne ” 20 

.55 The Three Guardsmen. By Dumas. ... 20 

56 Phantom Fortune. Miss Braddon.... 20 

57 Shirley. By Charlotte Bront6 20 


NO. PRICE, 

58 By the Gate of the Sea. D. C. Murray 10 

59 Vice Versa. ByF. Anstey 20 

60 The Last of the Mohicans. Cooper.. 20 

61 Charlotte Temple. By Mrs. Rowson. 10 

62 The Executor. Mrs. Alexander.. 20 

63 The Spy. By J. Fenim ore Cooper. .. 20 

64 A Maiden Fair. By Charles Gibbon.. 10 

65 Back to the Old Home. By M. C. Hay 10 

66 The Romance of a Poor Young Man. 

By Octave Feuillet R 

67 Lorna Doone. By R. D, Blackmore.. 3 

68 A Queen Amongst Women. By the 

Author of “ Dora Thorne ” 10 • 

69 Madolin’s Lover. By the Author of j 

“Dora Thorne” 20 \ 

70 White Wings. By William Black .... 10 

71 A Struggle for Fame. Mrs. Riddell.. 20 

72 Old My ddel ton’s Money. ByM. C. Hay 20 

73 Redeemed by Love. By the Author of 

“Dora Thorne” 20 i 

74 Aurora Floyd. By Miss M. E. Braddon 20 

75 Twenty Years After. By Dumas... 20 

76 Wife in Name Only. By the Author of j 

“Dora Thorne” 20 

77 A Tale of Two Cities. By Dickens 2 

78 Madcap Violet. By William Black... 2 ' 

79 Wedded and Parted, By the Author 

of “ Dora Thorne ” 10 ‘ 

80 June. By Mrs. Forrester 20 

81 A Daughter of Heth, By Wm. Black. 20 

82 Sealed Lips. By F. Du Boisgobey, .. 20 

83 A Strange Story. Bulwer Lytton 20 

84 Hard Times. By Charles Dickens... 20 

85 A Sea Queen. By W. Clark Russell.. 

86 Belinda. By Rhoda Broughton ; 

87 Dick Sand; or, A Captain at Fifteen. ‘ 

By Jules 'Verne 2 

88 The Privateersman. Captain Marryat 20 

89 The Red Eric. By R. M^. Ballantyne. 10 

90 Ernest Maltravers. Bulwer Lytton . . 20 

91 Baruaby Rudge. By Charles Dickens. 30 

92 Lord Lynne’s Choice. By the Author 

of “Dora Thome ” 20 

93 Anthony Trollope’s Autobiography.. 20 

94 Little Dorrit. By Charles Dickens. ..30 

95 The Fire Brigade. R. M. Ballantyne 10 

96 Erling the Bold. By R. M. Ballantyne 10 

97 All in a Garden Fair. Walter Besant. . 20 

98 A Woman-Hater. By Charles Reade. 20 

99 Barbara’s Histoiy, A. B. Edwards. . . 20 

100 20,000 Leagues Under the Seas. By 

Jules Verne ” 20 

101 Second Thoughts. Rhoda Broughton 

102 The Moonstone. By Wilkie Collins.. . 30 

103 Rose Fleming. By Doi*a Russell 10 

104 The Coral Pin. By F. Du Boisgobey. 30 I 

105 A Noble Wife. By John Saunders 20 i 

106 Bleak House. By Charles Dickens, . . 40 

107 Dombey and Son. Charles Dickens. . 40 i 

108 The Cricket on the Hearth, and Doctor 

Marigold. By Charles Dickens. ... 10 

109 Little Loo. By W. Clark Russell 20 

110 Under the Red Flag. By Miss Braddon 10 

111 The Little School-Master Mark, By 

J. H, Shorthouse 10 

112 The Waters of Marah. By John Hill 20 


(This Xiist is Coutinueil on Third Page of Cover.) 


THE SUN-MAID 


A BOMANCE. 


By miss. 'GRANT. 


“ Ein Fichtenbaiim steht einsam, 
Im Norden auf kahler Holi’. 

Ihn schlafert; mit weisser Decke 
Umhullep ilm Eis und Schnee. 

“ Er traumt von einer Palme, 

Die fern im Mor^enland 
Einsam und schweigend trauert 
Auf brennender Felsenwand.” 


H. Heixr. 


'V, 



NEW YORK 



GEORGE MUNRO, PUBLISHER, 


17 TO S7 Vanoewater Street. 



HER SERENE HIGHNESS, THE PRINCESS AMELIA,. 

OF SCHLESWIG HOLSTEIN, 

AND I DEDICATE IT TO THE A.EASA^T MEMORY OF WINTER 

I 

t 

EVENINGS AT THE MAISON CASENAVE 

SOME YEARS AGO. 





THE SUN-MAID. 


CHAPTER I. 

TERIIESTIIIAL PARADISE. 

In that sunny corner where the waves of the Bay of Biscay v 
over a sandy barrier and mingle with the waters of the Bidas; 
stream, they tell the ancient story that a favored mortal won froj 
(he gods permission to ask three blessings for Spain. 

He asked that her daughters might be beautiful, that her sonsr 
might be brave, and that her government might be good. 

The first two requests were granted — the beauty of a Spanish - 
woman is of world-wide renown ; and if the men are rash, passion- 
ate, and revengeful, at least they are brave — but the last request was 
refused. 

“ Impossible!” was the answer, “ impossible! Already she is an 
earthly paradise, and were this last blessing hers, the very gods 
themselves would desert Elysium, and go down to dwell in Spain.” 

This description does not apply to the whole of that country. 
There are long tracts through which the railroad passes from Pam- 
peluna to Madrid that are very dreary and unbeauteous; and there 
are dismal old towns to be found, dirty and uninviting, which sug- 
gest little of Paradise and much of earth. 

If a wandering mythological god, with the tastes which a Syba- 
rite might impute to him, were to come down to seek the Eden of 
Spain, he would journey far — across the passes of the Sierra Mo- 
rena; linger awhile on the genial slopes between the snowy hills and 
the rushing waters that surround Cordova; wander on to Seville, the 
center of soft Andalusia; and there, among the orange groves, in- 
haling the scented atmosphere, listening to the silvery murmur of 
the fountains, strolling in the brilliant Calle de la Sierpe, lounging 
through an evening in the glittering Alcazar, yielding to the soft in- 
fiuence of the scene and its surroundings, he might indeed exclaim 
that the ancient Eden of the poets was surely the Andalusia of Spain. 
So much for an old Sybarite deity, and his ideal of an Elysium. 

But, to a Northern nature — simple and hardy — such ideas of Par- 
adise are as unsympathetic as the sugar -cakes and orange- water a 
Spaniard offers by way of ordinary fare. Neither the dolce far 
nunte of Seville, nor the Alamede of shadeless Cadiz, nor the scent- 
ed atmosphere of Cordova, forms, indeed, to our mind, the PaT-*- 
dise of Spain. o fPic! 

There is another ratip-p nf country-ySi 
•ies, from the Allan ’ 


THE SUK-M'AID. 


e land of the Basque and the Bearnais, of the hardy mount- 
L th/i Spanish remnant of the old Komany tribes, 
from La Rhun, in the west, to beyond Le Fort, in the 
the Pyrenees fear their mighty royal crests, snow-crowned in 
in summer wrapped in a sunshine radiant and glorious as 
^•way of Heaven. Deep valleys, green and fertile, nestle in 
.)un tains; dancing water-falls and sparkling streams rush 
gh their gorges and down their rocky sides, 
e climate is temperate, the soil is rich, the harvest is plentiful, 
l e peasant is content. His life- is easy, and he himself is frugal 
’idustrious; he is large of limb, and strong and gentle, like the 
eyed oxen who draw his carts, help him to till his maize-fields, 
lear his purple vintage home. 1 

id we, who love this land, call it a Paradis terrestre, because 
s fair in ils happy sunshine — it is beautiful, it is plentiful, it is 
;ace. 

ji;t our Paradise is terrestrial, when all is said; and of this we are 
.wfetimes reminded as we realize that it grows fair and green anr 
iirtile, even only as other lands, beneath “ the gentle rain fror 
heaven,” and that if many days of the year it is glad with radiauo 
sunsliine, and smiling beneath a cloudless sky, we cannot conscien- 
tiously assert that it is always so. 

ilost particularly, it was not so, on^ evening in the autumn days 
of a certain year, not long ago, when the express train from Bor- 
deaux traveled slowly glong past Puyoo and Orthez, glided below 
-the woody ridge overhanging the river just opposite Juran 9 on, and 
stopped at the station of Pan. 

it was late, but there was no reason that it should hurry itself just 
then. There wcTe few passengers, the summer season of the mount- 
ain-traveler was over, the winter season had not begun; and when 
the engine puffed leisurely up to the platform, a few peasants re- 
turning from a day’s work, a few w'omen laden with market-baskets 
and snowy piles of new- washed linen, a fusty-lookiug old personage 
with a large umbrella and a pair of spectacles (evidently a “ notary,” 

- who had been making a will or drawing up a marriage contract 
somewhere doWn the line), a fat priest, and a single first-class pas- 
senger, were the whole freight that, emerging from the carriages, 
sent the train almost empty on its way. 

- The peasant-laborers pulled their flat bonnets close down on their 
foreheads, shouldered their sticks and bundles, and lounged out of 
the station one by one. 

The women chattered together in a noisy patois, execrated the 
weather, 1 ucked up their petticoats, hoisted large cotton tents over 
their heads, slung their big baskets across their arms, and hurried 
away. 

The old noiaire picked his steps gingerly, and, with much effusion 
and reverential salutation, offered half the* protection of his umbrella 
to the priest; while the first-class passenger plunged his hands deep 
’»'tn the pockets of a huge overcoat, shivered, shrugged his shoul- 
- disconsolately about him, > •'u, somebod}' ’s remark, 

' story of the gt}^ ^ing at the moment 
■ '■''Hi, soito r- ■ 

1 


THE SUN' MAID. 




“ And this is what they call a Paradis ierrestre! I would sooner 
live in the Lincolnshire Fens!” 

The remark was not inappropriate, neither was the comparison it 
implied — a comparison wdiich revealed him at once to be of that re- 
markable nation who grumble so much at the weather at all seasons, 
and wherever they go, that you really would imagine they had some- 
thing better at home — an Englishman. , 

In fact, he could never have been mistaken for anything else. 
The whole make of his figure — tall, straight, firm, expressing ease 
and strength — was British. 

The cut of his coaL which was made of rough frieze, long and 
loose, reaching to his heels, drawn up close over his ears, was En 
glish likewise, and so was the coloring of his brown hair and long 
mustache— all that could be seen of him between the tweed stalking- 
cap drawn over his eyes and the high collar of his traveling-coat. 

It was not a becoming costume in which to introduce a hero, but 
even in this attire you could see that he was young and, as to figure, 
at all events, well -looking ; and, if you studied him critically, as one 
traveler scans another upon a wet day upon a wayside platform, you 
might discern that at this Pau railway station he was not at ail at 
home. 

It was raining heavily; a steady, unceasing downpour; the air 
was soft, but damp and chilly. A curling mist lay thick over the 
waters of the river just beyond the station; a line of low, undulat- 
ing hills was barely visible through the vapors on one side, and on 
the other loomed high above him the somber ramparts of the old cas- 
tle, and the long rows of hotels and villas that, with their slojung 
gardens, front the valley, and form the outer boundary of the town 
of Pau. 

At his feet lay a leathern traveling bag, very English also. It 
suggested ” Asprey,” with the initials G. S. E., in dim gold, on the 
outer fiap. From the side-pocket of his coat protruded the silver 
top of a hunting-flask; and the fragrant smoke of a very good IMa- 
nilla curled from his lips into the air. He looked about him very dis- 
consolately; the position was unpleasant. He glanced at his bag; 
he gazed after the train that was gliding slowly away into the mist; 
he looked up and down the station; he emitted several British 
growls ; and, finally, catching sight of a traveling-case and a port- 
manteau disappearing through a distant doorway, on the shoulders 
of a man in cotton -blue trousers and shirt, he darted rapidly dowm 
the platform, seized the portmanteau wdth one hand, and collared 
the lithe little porter with the other. 

A volley of expostulation, indignant and excitable, was the conse- 
qence, to which our traveler replied with the word ” baggage,” laying 
as much emphasis on the last syllable by way of French accent as 
possible; and pointing to the exit from the station, where a vow of 
cabs and carriages might be seen standing in the rain, he gave the 
♦order, in slow and very careful but fairly grammatical French, that 
his luggage might be there conveyed. 

Impossible 1 In fiercer excitement than ever, the little blue-shirted 
man was off again, and far out of reach of apprehension immediate- 
ly. He was inexorable, and clung to his portmanteau, till finally, in 
much wrath and indignation, the youn^ Englishman turned from 


6 


THE SUK-MAID. - 


him, walked down the station, and in at the door of the waiting- 
room, followed by his luggage and its carrier, who vociferated un- 
ceasingly unintelligible information about baggage and tickets and 
offices, reiterating regulations, all of which the traveler, if he had ever 
knowm them, had forgotten long ago. 

At the door of the waiting-room, the little porter, forbidden by 
rule to go further, stood gesticulating still, while a fat official rushed 
up to our indignanW friend, and, exclaiming, “Monsieur, pardon, 
but” — he pointed to a placard on which was legibly inscribed, 
“ Here one smokes not,” and at the same time politely, but firmly, 
he indicated the cigar. 

The young fellow drew himself up, and turned upon the official 
with some haughtiness, and was just preparing in his mind a fitting 
answer by which to express his sense of offense and injured dignity; 
when there ran suddenly into the station-room a small man, hat in 
hand, neatly attired in a dark livery, out of breath — in tact, positive- 
ly out of himself with eagerness, fussiness, and consequential haste. 

His face beamed with excitement and amiability, as he bowed low 
again and again, and exclaimed, in what he evidently thought was 
English ; 

“ blister Sare Geelbert! a thousand weelkomms! A thousand par- 
dons that 1 am not here to you receive!” 

“ Ha, Baptiste, is it really you? How are you?” and the young 
man turned from the official to hold out his hand cordially to his 
bowing and excited friend. ‘ ‘ Here 1 am, you see, turned up at last. ” 

“ Enchanted, Mister Sare Geelbert! How jojful will Madame la 
Marquise be. and Monsieur le Vicomte Morton ! Ah, 1 have a note 
— 1 must tell you — he is so desolated, desolated, and so is Monsieur 
le Marquis as well. They could not come to-day to meet you, but I 
am here to weelkomm you, Sare Geelbert — see — and to-morrow the 
messieurs will drive you to the chateau themselves.” 

“ Ah, then, I do not go over to St. Hilaire to-night?” 

“No, monsieur. You will be fatigued — you must rest— your 
long journey— the time, the weather, I would say, defends it. You 
will repose at the town hotel of the marquis this evening, and to- 
mbrrow you will go to St. Hilaire.” 

“ Ah, very good! But my luggage—” He paused, removed his 
cigar, and turned inquiringly to the railway official, who had stood, 
silent and much astonished, during Baptiste’s harangue. 

The man bowed now ceremoniously to the traveler, and was about 
to speak, when the fussy little Bearnais broke in again ; 

“ xih, your baggage, Sare Geelbert! Be tranquil— 1 charge myself . 
Pass, monsieur, pass out. I wull be with you this instant. Give me 
only your tickets, I will arrange all. Monsieur Dalou,” he added, 
in French, turning to the official pompously, “ let pass this monsieur, 
lyiilor Sare Geelbert Erie, the nephew of Madame la Marquise de St. 
Hilaire. ’ ’ 

The station-master responding, “Ah, perfectly,” in the irrele- 
vant manner m which the nation use that word, smiled and bowed . 
benignly again, and “ Sare Geelbert,” producing his tickets with a 
hearty laugh at Baptiste’s introduction, handed them to the official, 
put his cigar into his mouth again, and walked out to the station 
dr*or. 


TIIK SUX-MAID. 


'V 


Tie stood there M^aiting for the servant, and again he shrugged his 
shoulders, and mentally confessed the prospect to be dismal in the 
extreme. 

A steep bank rose close in front of him, and on the height above 
towered some large buildings scarcely to be distinguished in the fog 
and gloom. 

A long terrace of houses, standing apart and independent of each 
other, stretched on each side: on the one hand ending in the turrets 
of the castle, standing darkly against the background of a ridge of 
w^ood; on the other lost in the "wall of dense vapory mist that floated 
down the valley, and that filled and obscured it. 

There was no one to be seen on the steep road that wound up to the 
terrace, and no one at the station. He seemed the only traveler; all 
the coaches had departed in despair, and there was no population 
apparent. 

So it seemed to him at first, as he stood there; but suddenly along 
a road that lay level with^the station, close to a narrow water-course, 
fringed by two rows of trees, there came the tinkling musical echo 
of a bell, and then emerged just opposite to him an ox-cart, laden 
with great piles of wood and drawn slowly along by two strong, 
gentle-looking dun-colored creatures with long, branching horns. 
They were led, apparently (not driven), by a man who walked 
actively before them, touching their horns lightly with a short wand 
from time to time. His blue shirt, and a bit of crimson rug flung 
over his huge beasts, made a bright bit of color in the gloomy scene; 
and altogether they brought life and action into the prospect as they 
passed the station, moving leisurely along — a curious, picturesque 
group. 

They amused Sir Gilbert till Baptiste came rushing out, laden with 
the traveling-bag and wrappers, and with a countenance radiant with 
complacency and importance. 

“ ISlow,” he exclaimed, “ will monsieur walk? It is but a step; 
but perhaps— ah, itrainsterriblyl—SareGeelbert will have a coach.” 

“ JNo, nonsense! I will walk, Baptiste. ISIever mind the rain— how 
do we go? Lead the way,” 

” Ah, well — this is the road. Frangois has the baggage . hi 
bring it safe. Now, if you will permit, monsieur;” and with a stiff 
little bow he walked on a few steps before, while Sir Gilbert, with 
long, easy strides, followed leisurely behind him. 

Baptiste was a short, slight man, but he augmented his stature as 
much as possible by carrying his head (as became the confidential 
servant of Monsieur le Marquis deSt. Hilaire) very erect indeed, whth 
his nose poised high in the air. He wore a long frock coat slightly 
trimmed, just sufficiently to indicate the family livery and colors. 
He had a high stiff neckcloth and collar with sharp-pointed gills that 
stuck up far above his ears. He had black hair, and dark, heavy 
eyebrow^s. His deep-set eyes had an honest look in thern, and an 
immense variety of expression besides — ready to flash with excite- 
ment and anger, or to sparkle with fun. He had a queer little 
mouth, which he was fond of shutting up with an odd air of mys- 
tery and importance if you asked him a simple question, and hap- 
pened to be in a hurry for the reply ; and the expression meant that 
you would have to wait for it. He was a true Bearnais in features; 


THE SUX-MAID. 


8 


and his complexion was of that curious gray shady color peculiar to 
all men of his race. 

He stepped out in front of Sir Gilbert with much precision, with 
lips pursed up and nose in air, as if deeply impressed with the im- 
portance of his post and of the occasion; and as they wound up the 
hill he announced each object they encountered, each house they 
reached, with all the ceremony of an introduction, and with the dig- 
nity of a chamberlain. 

“ The Establishment of the Baths,” he said, as they paused a 
moment at the first stage of the steep incline. “And that is the 
beautiful new Hotel de France above, monsieur, here to the right 
hand. And that is the top of the Hotel Gassion on the left side, and 
further is tne chateau; and that is Jurancon away across the Gave, 
and these are the Coteaux — the low hills, I mean. Oh, I do deplore 
the time that Bare Geelbert cannot see the prospect, and the mount- 
ains and the towers of St. Hilaire. But courage! It will pass, 1 
assure you. Be not despairing, monsieur—it will not endure.” 

“ Then it does not rain here always — not quite always — does it, 
Baptiste?” 

“ But, monsieur! Sare Geelbert ! God forbid ! no. Be tranquil; 
you will see. Are you reposed? You will be injured. It does fall 
most tembly. Will you continue? Still a little mount. ” 

“lam ready. And they are all well, Baptiste, at St. Hilaire? My 
uncle and aunt, and the vicomte and madame my cousin, they are 
all well?” 

“ All perfectly,” said Baptiste, still airing his English in persist- 
ent repression of Gilbert’s French. “Madame la Marquise and 
Monsieur le Marquis are of most perfectly good health, and Mon- 
sieur le Yicomte Morton is so also, and likewise as well is 
Mademoiselle Jeanne de Yeuil, the most charming’ fiancee of Mon- 
sieur le Yicomte Morton; and Madame de la Garonne is with mon- 
sieur her husband at the Chateau deYal d’Oste; but she comes, with 
her little ones, soon, very soon, to see Sare Geelbert. Ah, monsieur, 
they are all joyful to receive you. But you are changed, indeed, 
since I saw you ten years ago. You remember, monsieur, when 1 
took in charge the young vicomte to Erie’s Lynn?” 

“ I remember. Ten years ago. Is it really so much? You wear 
well, Baptiste : you look as young as ever. ’ ’ 

“ Ah, Sare Geelbert is'^amiable!” said Baptiste, complacently, 
“ And,” he continued, lowering his voice as he turned round with 
an odd expression of awe and increased deference, “ and miladi, the 
noble mother of Sare Geelbert, the Lady Anna, is she well?” 

“ Quite well, Baptiste. I hope to find some letters from her; I 
missed them somehow in Paris.” 

“ There are letters,” answered Baptiste, “in the apartments of 
Sare Geelbert. ” 

“ Ah, that is right! Then we will go on,” 

They wound up the steep hill a little further, and a few paces 
more brought them to the Place Royale, a broad, open space that 
stretched back from the edge of the terrace, and was crossed at the 
further end by the Rue du Lycce, just where the narrow Rue St. 
Louis turned up below the plate-glass windows of La Fontaine’s 
shop. 


9 


’the SL'J^-MAID. 

f- boulevai’d, that stretched 

fur along below and beyond the chateau td the entrance of the old 
paused again at this point, partly to gain breath 

“ There, monsifur!” Se 

A 1th much pride and pomposity he pointed across the foggy valley 

^ Bearnais and the hSge hotel’ 

and hnally to the statue of Henri IV. which adorned the Place in the 
dnnhi*’ stood out with much dignity and effect beween a 
double bouleyard of autumnal-tinted trees 

Sir Gilbert sauntered up to the foot of the statue, and looked up 
interest at the handsome, rugged face; then the ring of 
Macau ay s ballad came back to his mind, and he was just murmur- 
ing to himself some old favorite stirring lines of “ Vouno- Henry of 
Navarre,” and enjoying the reminiscence, when Baptilte touched 
him on the arm, and pointed with sudden and eager excitement 
toward two figures— the only personages who on this rainy evening' 
shmed the Place Royale with Henri IV. and themselves. ^ ^ 

These figures were tall and slight, and — they were feminine’ they 
were clad in giay waterproof, reaching to their heels; they wore 
smaU round hats; they carried umbrellas; and on the other side of 
the Jrlace, between two rows of trees, they were engaged in energetic 
and evidently constitutional exercise. ° 

“ Ah whispered Baptiste. “ Two Mees — English — they do 
promenade themselves. Extraordinary! is it not, ah? not to com- 
prehend!” 

. Taking a coi^titutional, and not a very pleasant one, I should 
think, said Sir Gilbert. 

*1.*' English— ah! but there are not many now, only two or 

three. But wait, you will see— the beautiful families -who will 
arrive-— when winter is come. But, Sare Geelbert, you will cold 
yourself, and you have not an umbrella like the English Mees- come 
monsieur, let us proceed;’; and on they walked, leaving the “ Mees ’’ 
to pound up and down with the national and characteristic energy 
which distinguished them. 

Turning the corner into the Rue du Lycee, they followed the nar- 
row pavement until a few yards brought them to a handsome arch- 
way, to a large gate closed and barred, and to a low postern door, 
at which Baptiste rung a huge bell with much noisiness and 
authority. It flew open, and they entered a wide, paved courtvard 
flanked by coach house and stables on one side, and by servants’ 
dwellings on the other. 

A queer old-fashioned French hotel, such as Gilbert had never en- 
tered before. 

It was a square stone house, decorated at the top by a handsome 
balustrade; it had broad windows, and wide maible steps leading up 
to a high doorway, through which they passed into a tesselated hall. 

A matted^ staircase led to the floor above, and up this Baptiste con- 
ducted Gilbert with much ceremony, explaining as he went that the 
first flat of rooms, or the “ rez de chaussee,” as he called them, were 
not inhabited by the marquis, but let in the winter season to ” a 
beautiful English family,” when he could catch one. 

At the first landing they reached another closed door, and a red bell- 
jope, at which Baptiste vigorously pulled again and again during the 


10 


THE SUN-MAID. 


two minutes that passed before the door opened; and then, ushering 
Sir Gilbert, he trotted in. 'In the corridor, holding the door open 
for them, they found a pretty, dark-eyed girl, with a bright-red, 
handkerchief tied round her head. She smiled and courtesied with 
enthusiasm as Baptiste indicated “Monsieur the NefHiew!" and 
marched past her with dignity into the house. 

They entered now a wide corridor, carpeted with warm crimson 
drugget, and lighted by a large window looking into the court. From 
this they passed into an octagon ante-room lighted from the top, with 
a round center-table and a few high-backedcarved oak chairs. A 
door opened on each of its eight symmetrical sides. 

Here Baptiste paused again to introduce and indicate “ The draw- 
ing-room of Madame la Marquise; the dining-saloon; the library of 
Monsieur le Marquis; the boudoir of madame; and here,” he con- 
tinued, advancing at last toward a fifth door, and proceeding to 
open it, “ is the apartment of Monsieur le Vicomte Morton de St. 
Hilaire, which is prepared, Sare Geelbert, to receive you.” 

The bright, ruddy glare of a wood fire met them as the door 
opened, and Gilbert, entering the room after his chilly journey and 
his damp walk, felt instantly less gloomy and disconsolate, and more 
at home. 

It was exactly like the smoking, writing, or reading room of any 
young Englishman addicted in a moderate degree to these three 
occupations, and also to the ordinary list of English amusements and 
sports. It had a large window opening down the center on to a 
balcony that hung over the sloping garden, the foggy valley, and 
the hidden view. The floor was parquet, but comfortably covered 
in the center and at the writing-table and fire-place by a thick Per- 
sian carpet of rich and beautiful hues. A pair of huge arm-chairs 
flanked the fire-place; several cases, tall and richly carved, held a 
supply of books. A set of hunting prints, which Gilbert recognized 
as presents from himself to the vicomte, hung round the walls. 
There was a rack for sticks and driving and riding whips; there 
w'ere endless devices for holding pipes of every variety and size, and 
for displaying them to advantage; and, lastly, there was a bright, 
%varm glow from the huge logs burning in an open fire-place, where 
shining encaustic tiles and big brass dogs look the place of an En- 
glish grate and hearth-stone. 

“A capital room ” — and so Gilbert pronounced it as he stood on 
the rug, and Baptiste divested him of his long overcoat and wet 
traveling-cap; and then he rubbed his hands with satisfaction before 
the glowing fire, pushed back the damp hair from his forehead, 
shook himself vigorously together to dissipate the sensation of chill, 
and finally flung himself into a deep leather chair on one side the 
fire-place, and resigned himself to repose. 

Meanwhile Baptiste — with many and verbose apologies for the ab- 
sence of the household and proper stall of attendants for the occa- 
sion-proceeded with great ceremony to prepare for Gilbert’s dinner. 
He placed a cozy little round table close to the fire, and by the lime 
his young guest was thoroughly warmed, had glanced over his 
mother’s letters, and had. discovered that he was hungry, there was 
a delicate little repast quite ready for him, and Baptiste was an- 
nouncing solemnly that monsieur was served. 


THE SUX-MAID. 


11 


And served he was, with wonderful pomp and ceremony. Bap- 
tiste conducting him through many courses, each of which he an- 
nounced in loud tones as he placed them on the table; Potage,” 
“ filets de soles,” “ cotelettes S, la soubise,” fricandeau de veau,” 
and finally, much to Gilbert’s consolation, real “ bifstek a I’An- 
glaise, ” specially prepared, and particularly suitable for the occa- 
sion and for the hungry guest. 

Having dined comfortably, Gilbert felt At length able to dismiss 
Baptiste, and to see him, as he hoped, disappear for the last time 
into the corridor, bearing the relics of his dessert. But no, lie re- 
turned again. He had still to fidget about, to place coffee, with a 
case of the vicomte’s cigars at Gilbert’s side, to pile fresh wood on 
the fire, to draw the window -curtains, to bring a reading-lamp, and 
specially to talk the whole time in ceaseless explanation and apology, 
and in repeated expressions of his ardent hope that he and the ‘ ‘ girl 
of tlie country, Madeline ” (he he called her of the bright handker- 
chief and the dark smiling eyes), might succeed in making Mon- 
sieur Sare Geelbert comfortable for just this night. 

Gilbert had no doubt of it; in fact, he felt eveiy thing that was 
nnost pleasantly comfortable at that moment — a little sleepy, a little 
tired, rather desirous to read his home budget, and extremely anx- 
ious to get rid of Baptiste. Finally, the door closed behind him, 
and Sir Gilbert leaned back in his chair with an exclamation of re- 
lief. 

And now his letters might be perused in tranquillity. They lay 
beside him in a tempting pile; the lamp burned softly; the fire 
flamed up with cheery, crackling sounds, and suffused a warm, de- 
licious glow over the room, wWle he, gazing into it with a soft 
shady look in his eyes, sunk into a half-drowsy reverie as a feeling 
of pleasant repose crept over him, and his thoughts wandered 
dreamily back along the track of his journey till they reached his 
own fireside, in his own English home, and there they lingered. 

That home was very dear to him, and, indeed, odd as it may seem 
in this nineteenth century, he now left it almost for the first time — 
at least, for any length of absence. 

An autumn in Scotland, a few weeks in London, a month in isor- 
way, he had occasionally achieved before ; but now he had broken 
through a routine that had hitherto ruled his life, and he had come 
away, leaving his covers and his hunting, his Kennel and his stud, 
for how long he knew not. 

Some undefined influence had come across him, given this new 
turn to his life, and inspired the idea in his _mind that he would 
travel ; and there were family circumstances which naturally inclined 
him toward the valleys of the Pyrenees at the very outset of his 
travels; that accounted, indeed, for his being here, in Morton de St. 
Hilaire’s smoking-room on this autumn evening, and for the start- 
ing-point of all his intended joiirneyings being the town of Pau. 

” Sare Geelbert Airrl as Baptiste called him— properly Gilbert 
Stanton Erie, tenth baronet of Erie’s Lynn and Terwarden, Sussex 
— had come very early to his title and estates. 

His father had been the ninth baronet, his mother had been a s^- 
ter of the old Earl of Deningham, and Madame la Marquise de St. 
Hilaire was his aunt on his mother’s side. 


1 ;> 


THE SUiy'-MAID. 


It was one of the odd results of certain peculiarities in his family 
characteristics that he had never been to visit her before ; and if 
merely to* understand this, we will follow for a moment the course 
of his thoughts as they wander back to his home in Sussex, and lin- 
ger with them as they center round the memory of the elderly lady 
who occupies this autumn evening the large room of Erie’s Lynn, 
alone. 

A stately personage, tall, handsome, and imposing, Gilbert could 
see her distinctly in his mind’s eye, sitting solitary and silent, with a 
large pile of wood-work by her side, a round table quite near her, 
on which lay neat little books, dim in covering, serious in contents. 
The vast room he knew was solitary from his absence, and the large 
house silent because his voice was gone. 

Such was his home ; such was its only inmate, his mother, who 
lived there, with him and for him only, to direct his concerns, to 
rule his servants, to care for his tenantry in both spiritual and bodily 
estate, and, hitherto, to possess him, her only child, in complete and 
exclusive devotion of affection, energy, and will. 

Gilbert’s father, Sir Stanton Erie, had married Lady Anna Mor- 
ton somewhat late in life, and in so doing (her parents being dead) 
he had given home and protection to a younger sister, the Lady Vio- 
let, a gay little personage, who, during her short residence in Sir 
Stanton’s house, had given him infinite trouble and continual cause 
of offense. 

Sir Stanton was of the pompous and narrow-minded type of rustic 
Englishmen — a king in his own estate, an autocrat, and a bigot; the 
sort of man who loves to crush a new idea in its very bud, to stamp 
-out reform, to enforce game-laws, to support magisterial power with 
unflinching severity and rigor. He said his prayers very loudly in 
church, and would doubtless, if possible, have imitated the sovereign 
of his early youth, and ejaculated “Very proper!’’ when petitions 
for those high in authority, and for the noble house of Erie of Erie’s 
Lynn in particular, came in as a special clause in the parish prayers. 

He chose Lady Anna as a fitting spouse because he liked her rank ; 
he admired her stately presence; he thought her dignity became a 
lady of Erie’s Lynn, and her cold manner suited his ideas of aristo- 
cratic composure. 

He accepted Lady Violet as “ a cross;’’ and when six months 
after his marriage, she eloped with his special abhorrence— a French- 
man — he looked upon the event as a true deliverance, and, much as 
he pretended displeasure, felt in reality deWght. He determined to 
cut the connection completely, and circumstances assisted him to 
carrj’ out his resolve. 

Lady Violet went south with her reprehensible young husband, 
who, by and by, palliated his iniquity to some extent by succeeding 
unexpectedly to the honors of St. Hilaire. Sir Stanton died and was 
buried, and a grand mausoleum was erected in his memory, as be- 
came the ninth baronet of the house of Erie. 

Lady Anna took to piety at this time of a very extreme type, very 
low, very narrow, very straight indeed; and, by dint of much devo- 
tion and obedience therein, she made her life as colorless and un- 
eventful at Erie’s Lynn as it could possibly be with the presence of 
a healthy, loud-voiced, merry-faced boy growing up in the midst of 


THE SUN-MAID. 


13 

it. He warmed her heart in spite of herself. He thawed much in 
her nature that constitution and her husband’s principles had com- 
bined to render icy and cold; and he molded his own existence, 
developed his own powers, and lived out his own free simple life 
with an independence that gave early evidence in his character of 
consideraole energy and force. 

Lady Anna could never make quite what she wished of Gilbert. 
She could not tame the high spirits, or dull the bright, defiant eyes, 
or hush the loud, merry laugh that rang through the halls and cor- 
ridors; and, indeed, much anxiety and concern did she suffer in her 
narrow, well-meaning, mistaken mind as she realized her failures in 
this respect. She found the boy grown up free, active, full of wild, 
buoyant spirits, in spite of her; and it must be confessed that, while 
the standard of her creed discountenanced and mourned him, in her 
woman’s heart, full of motherly pride and delight, she adored him 
utterly, and thought him first of all created beings. 

He was a good son to her, indeed, and very devoted on his side; 
and if she could not make all of his character and habits that she 
might have wished, still during his early years she could exercise 
much external control. She was guardian and executrix exclusively 
^at Erie’s Lynn, and she could ordain in his boyhood the chief cir- 
cumstances of his life. So she hemmed him in, and shut the world 
out, and kept him always at home with herself, and with tutors 
chosen by her; thus bringing him up in a tropical atmosphere shut 
carefully in from that wicked world where, as she really believed 
and asserted, fierce, fiery lions went ravening to and fro. 

Worse than all the lions, however, to the mind of Lady Anna, 
was the Red W oman — Babylon — the City on the Seven Hills, even 
the Romish Church, into whose bosom Lady Violet had entered 
when other homes and churches had cast her quite away ; and bit- 
ter to Lady Anna’s heart and fearful to her soul was a day some ten 
years ago, while Gilbert was still a little boy in jackets, youthful 
and impressionable, when Lady Violet, now Marquise de St. Hilaire, 
WTote to her sister in tender terms of reconciliation, announcing Jhat 
her only boy, who bore her own old family name, and was called 
31orton Vicomte de St. Hilaire, was on his way to school in Surrey 
under the charge of a faithful servant, and that she fii-st proposed to 
send him to Erie’s Lynn to make acquaintance with his English 
cousin and aunt. 

So he came — there was no help for it, notwithstanding the Lady 
in Red ; and, as might have been expected, the boys took to each 
other with quick interest and devotion. Morton soon perfected his 
English, and Gilbert from that visit began to study French. 

But Morton went home again, and at Erie’s Lynn his cousin grew 
up to his routine life, and for long it satisfied him. 

It was such a continual round ; something for every month, some- 
thing to make it impossible to go far from home. 

Hunting in winter, fishing in spring, a bit of London in summer, 
then grouse in the autumn, and covers till the cub-hunting began 
again. And the interests of a landlord always, a love of his home, 
and a tenderness for his mother, all kept him tied to his own fire- 
side, as jrear after year slipped away, and the long-promised visit to 
St. Hilaire and Morton remained unpaid. 


14 


THE SUN-MAID. 


At length, however, the fancy had seized him, and, in simple 
obedience to his fancy, here he was. 

A tall fellow, now, of five-and-twenty, with the sort of appearance 
people call “ nice-looking;” with auburn brown hair and mustache, 
and with well-marked brows and eyelashes many shades darker than 
the hair. 

In features and build of figure he had taken after his mother’s 
family, and was not at all like Sir Stanton, who had been a portly 
and a pompous old man. 

The Deningham cast of face had been called ” aristocratic,” and 
Gilbert and his mother possessed it, fully developed in outline of 
feature, and especially in the brilliant smile that had lighted up the 
cold countenances of generations of Deninghams like the chill shin- 
ing of the sun upon ice. 

The stately old lady at Erie’s Lynn was distinguished for this 
family smile; it would flit suddenly across her face again and again 
in moods of peculiar amiability or graciousness, but it touched only 
the lips, and never warmed or softened the cold, hard eyes — and Gil- 
bert possessed the same smile — quick, brilliant, and flashing; but 
with him the dark-blue eyes glistened also when he was pleased or 
happy, and a sof t^ caressing expression came into them that was very 
sweet, and might certainly be very dangerous. 

As he sat now musing over his mother’s letters, dreaming of his 
journey, enjoying the pleasant sense of repose, and glancing from 
time to time round the apartment in contemplation of his novel 
surroundings, and probably also in mental contemplation of the new 
experiences opening up before him, his face gained more and more 
an expression of contented satisfaction, and altogether you would 
have described him just then as a bright-hearted looking fellow, 
cheerful, simple-minded, and full of confidence in life. And this 
was indeed hitherto about the beginning and end of him. His 
character was undeveloped, and his experience as limited as his 
range of thought. 

At present, finding little to arrest his meditations in the retrospect 
of his rapid journey, in the gloomy impressions of the afternoon, or 
in the moderate excitement of curiosity with which he looked for- 
ward to seeing his relatives on the Pyrenees, they soon gravitated to 
their familiar home- center again, and he turned to the last dated of 
his mother’s letters. 

It was a characteristic epistle. After many pages, WTitten in a 
stifC, lady-liKe hand, filled with very primitive details of sundry 
household events — telling of the excellence of the apple crop, of the 
fading of the garden flowers, and of the quick approach of autumn 
on the foliage in the park ; after reporting the regularity with which 
his phaeton horses and the hunters passed her window for their ex- 
ercise at break of day, and describing in the same parenthesis old 
Betty Tredgett’s gratitude for the last gift of her ladyship’s handi- 
work in Berlin wool, she passed on (and Gilbert’s eyes twinkled as 
he read) to the excellency of the vicar’s discourse on last Sunday 
morning, when he had attacked, as she reported. Ritualists, Roman- 
ists, and Broad-churchmen alike — a discourse which he had talked 
over most fully and agreeably with her in the evening. 

And “ Aly dear Gilbert,” she wrote in conclusion, you may be 


THE SUH-MAID. 


15 

•sure that my thoughts were with you during these hours. For the 
recollection came bitterly to me afresh that you are now rushing into 
the jaws of the very perils which Mr. Rayhroke painted with such 
eloquence and force— the perils of associations foreign to the whole 
spirit of the teachings of your youth. You know with what deep 
anxiety 1 shall follow your movements in the course of these jour- 
neyings, from which no entreaties of mine have been able to deter 
you. My heart aches as 1 realize that you are plunging into that 
world of Continental life so unknown to me, where, as 1 have been 
led to believe, dangers and temptations will beset your path, as re- 
gards which I have been able to thank God hitherto you have been 
kept a stranger. 1 do not know whether, as the picture crosses my 
mind of your probable associates, 1 tremble most at your peril from 
the influences and attractions of outlandish women, from the toils of 
a crafty priesthood, or from the many pernicious examples you must 
encounter in a lawless nation of Papists and unbelievers. 1 have 
been told that the charms of a foreign life are its chief peril, and that 
the beauties of nature and climate combine to ensnare young persons 
until they are at last actually tempted to forget what is due to their 
position, their personal dignity, their religious principles, and, in 
fact, to themselves. These remarks have a point and force Which 1 
shrink at present from indicating more clearly to you. 1 reserve 
further enlargement of my views until 1 think the fitting moment 
has arrived. My prayers and constant thoughts are with you, my 
dear Gilbert, and I remain, your affectionate mother, 

“A. Erle.” 

“ TV hat can the old lady be driving at?” soliloquized Gilbert, as 
he finished this letter. “ She seems to have worked herself up 
about something that 1 do not see through. 1 wonder whether I 
could send her a few lines to-night. 1 am very sleepy, but 1 dare 
say there would still be time.” 

He sat up and looked round the room as he thought thus, wonder- 
ing whether there were table and writing materials to be had of 
which he might avail himself without summoning Baptiste. Soon, 
in a comer, he espied the vicomte’s trim little appointment— a 
leather-covered writing-table fully fitted with every requirement, and 
evincing in the details a curious combination of English and Paris- 
ian taste. He rose immediately, carried his lamp into the corner, 
opened and arranged the writing-book, came back to the fireplace to 
stir up the wood and to light, one of his cousin’s cigars at the ruddy 
blaze, and at last, puflSng comfortably the while, he returned to the 
table, and began to write. His pen ran very fast and vehemently. 

“ My dear Mother, — 1 have just received your letters, and read 
them very comfortably ensconced at the end of my journey in Mor- 
ton’s snug smoking-room in the Rue du Lycee, Pau; and 1 think the 
best thing 1 can do is to answer them at once, though 1 am very 
tired and drowsy, and 1 see the door standing open into Morton’s 
snug bedroom, where I am to put up for the night. But you have 
written so much about foreign attractions., and charms, and beauties, 
and so forth, that 1 think 1 may as well relieve your mind at once 
by telling you that 1 don’t like the looks of things here at all. I have 


THE SUN-3IAID. 


16 

seen nothing satisfactory yet in my travels. I do not think the kind 
of amusement suits me in any way, and 1 should not wonder if be- 
fore many weeks you see me back again. 

“ 1 did not stay in Paris, only drove from one station to the other; 
so 1 can’t say anything good or bad for that city. Having a journey 
to accomplish, I pushed on as fast as possible to the end of it, as 
you know 1 generally like to do with anything 1 undertake. It was 
Very dark as 1 drove through Paris, and foggy, with pouring rain ; 
the lamps burned dimly in the streets, in consequence;- so 1 thought 
it, on the whole, rather dingy-looking. 

“ As to Pau—this terrestrial Paradise of iMorton’s— 1 do not like 
it a bit. 1 cannot think how they can live here. 1 walked up from 
the station and had a good view of the town, and it struck me as a 
regularly ugly place, a row of big, square, and very dull -looking 
houses standing on a sort of terrace which overhangs a long damp 
valley quite coshered with fog. 

“ Their mountains are about as high as the so-called ‘ mountains ^ 
of people who have never been to Scotland, and they simply teach 
'iiie how the geography books of our schoolroom days can lie. A 
long low range of insignificant-looking hills was all I could distin- 
guish ; and Morton always said the finest view of the Pyrenees at Pau 
was from his smoking-room window. 

“ I saw an old priest at the station, by the bye, and thought of the 
Vatican and— you. But 1 fancy a very prolonged exposure to his 
influence would be needed to shake my fidelity to our mother 
Church. And as to the fair sex, to whom you allude so pointedly, 
I beheld two compatriots in water-proof promenading the place, but 
did not think they looked attractive. 1 must confess, however, and 
give the Bearnais maidens their due, that they are very pretty. 1 
like the way they tie up their heads in gay-colored handkerchiefs, 
and they certainly have darker eyes and brighter smiles than any- 
thing 1 have ever seen among the rustics of our Lynn. But still, 1 
do not think you need agitate yourself with the fear that I shall 
present you with a daughter-in-law Vvhose capacity in conversation 
is limited to patois. 

“ In fact, dear mother, I think you will soon have me home again 
— much as 1 came away; perhaps a trifle more insular in my preju- 
dices, and echoing that cynical old Montaigne in his opinion, 

‘ Qu’on voyage moins pour s’instruire que pour se desillusionner. ’ ” 
Etc., etc., etc. 

As he drew his pen across the paper in a firm, rapid line beneath 
his signature, a knock at the door made him look up, and Baptiste 
entered. 

“Ah, the very man I wanted!” said Gilbert, as he folded and 
closed his letter.- 

“ Sare Geelbert would send a letter to the post?” 

“Yes; is there still time?” 

“Perfectly; and it will catch the early mail to-morrow. I will 
take it myself . ” 

“ Ah, that is all right! Is it far to the post-office?” 

“ No, that is nothing; besides, I came in just to see if you are 
comfortable, monsieur, and to say that the time has re-made itself.” 


THE SUK-MAIH. ' 17 

“ The what? the time?” said Gilbert. ” It is about ten o’clock.” 

” Ah, but 1 would say the rain; it tumbles not more,” said Bap- 
tiste. ” The sky has raised itself— the mountains have been discov- 
ered— it makes a beautiful time.” 

” lYhat! it has cleared up? I am so glad! 1 thought It would 
rain forever, Baptiste. I have not had a fine moment since 1 crossed 
the Channel.” 

“Ah! but it is quick here— it is gone now— it is disappeared; will 
SareGeelbert see? The night is warm, beautiful; will Sare Geelbert 
finish his cigar on the vicomte’s balcon?” 

” Ralher a chilly smoking-room, eh?” 

” No, monsieur; there is cover, and carpet, and seat. Shall 1 push 
the curtain? Look, Sare Geelbert It is past; the storm is gone far 
away.” • 

He pushed back the hangings as he continued speaking, he opened 
the window, and Gilbert, who had moved to the fire, turned just at 
the moment in time to meet the breath of air, sweet and cool and 
scented, that came flowing into the hot room. It was delicious, 
touching his brow with the softness of rose petals, and drawing him 
instantly and irresistibly to the window, out on the balcony, and into 
the stilly night. 

“There!” exclaimed Baptiste, in his favorite expression of tri- 
umph. “ I told you— and now you see!” and then he stepped back 
and let fall the curtain, picking up the letter and preparing to depart 
with it, for no answe^' had come from Gilbert, who stood there, si- 
lenced as by an enchanter’s spell, gazing with beating heart and glis- 
tening eyes on the prospect. 

What had he felt? What had he said? What had he written? 
Words contemptuous and incredulous of the Pyrenees! and there 
now they lay before him. 

The rain had ceased, the mists had cleared away, the moon had 
risen, the sky was cloudless, and stretched, a vast and wondrous 
curtain, deep- blue and star-spangled, high above his head ; the low 
hills lay in the foreground, delicate and shadowy in outline, melting 
awaj’^ into the distance, and sloping softly to the riverside. The 
Gave, that had rushed so murkily under its foggy covering in the 
afternoon, lay now as a glittering thread of light, winding through 
the valley’s depths; cottage windows twinkled cheerily here and 
there upon the hill-sides, and lights gleamed among the woods that 
fringed the edges of the stream. Over all there seemed to hang a 
silvery veil that was at once mist and transparency, both shadow and 
light; and beyond this, and through this, as in a far distant and 
celestial dream-land, rose the mountains. In that silent wondrous 
majesty that speaks a language to the soul, the summit of the 
Midi d’Ossau towered in the archway of heaven; away in the shad- 
owy distance rose the mighty Pic de Bigqrre, and between and be- 
yond these, range upon range, pic above pec, stretched far across the 
western and the eastern sky. 

It was a sight such as stirs the heart and unseals it, mak^ the 
cheek flush, the eyes fill, and the head bend with reverence and awe; 
and Gilbert laid his cigar down on the balustrade, threw his head up 
with intense enjoyment to breathe the sweet, free mountain air; bent 
it again as the majesty of the scene overcame him, and words of 


18 ^ , THE SCX-MAID. 

wonder and exultation bui’st unbidden from his lips. Then he sunk 
on to Morton’s smoking-chair, and leaned his cheek against the stone- 
work, and gazed and gazed, while time passed on unheeded. His 
heart seemed full and laden with a wonderful sense of happiness, 
intoxicating and intense, and old memories and quaint old thoughts, 
and fair, fanciful dreams of his forgotten boyhood came gradually 
breaking over him, with strange movings of a new nature and of 
awakening sensibilities springing up unconsciously within him, born 
of the power and the inspiration and the glory of that wondrous 
scene. 


CHAPTER II. 

DAYLIGHir. 

Baptiste had been the confidential servant who had conveyed the 
voung Vicomte de St. Hilaire to Erie’s Lynn ten years ago, and dur- 
ing this visit he had perfected, as he imagined, his knowledge of the 
English language, and acquired a familiarity with English habits 
that was ever afterward his boast and pride. 

Ten years, however, was long enough to obliterate more recollec- 
tions than Baptiste would have liked to acknowledge, and this fact 
w'as evidenced on the following morning by his appearance in Gil- 
bert’s bedroom five minutes after that drowsy young person had 
waked up, and had vigorously pulled his bell-rope, laden with an 
immense tray covered with a tempting-looking breakfast of hot 
coflee, fresh rolls, toast and butter, beefsteaks, a large pot of jam, 
and a quantity of potatoes— a comical combination of national tastes 
which Baptiste had flattered himself was eveiything that was most 
British. 

“ Good gracious!” exclaimed Gilbert, “ what have you got there? 
Food! why, 1 have only this moment waked up!” 

” Sare, brekfast!” replied Baptiste, with energy. 

“ But 1 do not want it here, my friend. Why, I do not think 1 
have breakfasted in bed since 1 had the measles!” 

“But Sare Geelbert is fatigued; you will repose yourself, and 
while 1 open the curtains you will take a little refreshment.” 

” Nonsense, Baptiste! quite impossible! Please takedt away, and 
brins me a lot of cold water. ” 

” Monsieur will not eat. Ah, what a pity! I have had it hot and 
ready for him for an hour.” 

‘‘ Well, I won’t be ten minutes if you will only put it on the table 
in the next room — it will not get cold — only brfng me water, Bap- 
tiste, a — quantity — and something big to put it into, too.” 

“Ah!” responded Baptiste, in a tone of perfect comprehension, 
as he wheeled round slowly and unwillingly, carrying his sumptuous 
breakfast into the sitting-room “1 am there — 1 know. 1 forgot 
Sare Geelbert will have like Madame la Marquise and the vicomte — 
hold — yes, that is it — monsieur will have his will — it is possible;” 
which Gilbert was exceedingly glad to hear — both the permission 
and the possibility — for he had been looking rather ruefully all this 
time at the diminutive apparatus for achievement of the toilet, of 
which the gilded mirror was much the largest and most important 
item. 


THE SUN-MAID. 


19 

It was a pretty little bedroom, a trifle too luxurious and effemi- 
nate for his taste. The curtains had been closed carefully by Baptiste 
the night before, but between them came a ray of sunshine shooting 
in a straight line across the room like a silver-tipped arrow of light ; 
and it made Gilbert impatient to be up, to throw open the window, 
and to enjoy once more the glorious prospect that had bewitched him 
the night before. 

^ Much to his satisfaction, Baptiste returned presently from the 
sitting-room, slid back a narrow paneled door in the chintz-lined 
wall of the bedroom, and displayed to Gilbert’s sight a most com- 
pact little dressing-room, with cool, tempting-looking marble bath, 
and all those appliances for refreshment which he desired. 

Half an hour more and he was in the smoking-room, thoroughly 
rested from his long journey, trim, brushed, and polished, and— as 
he himself would have expressed it— “ as fresh as paint;” and then 
at last he satisfied Baptiste by doing ample justice to his excellent 
fare, enjoying at the same time his breakfast, the mountain view by 
daylight, and the delicious air floating in at the open window by 
which his table was placed. All this he accomplished in much 
cheerfulness and spirit, and in utter oblivion of the disconsolate let- 
ter he had sen^to Erie’s Lynn the evening before. 

Baptiste conversed as usual through th^e whole repast, uninvited 
and unceasingly, telling him, among other things, that the vicomte 
was sure to arrive at an early hour, as he was exceedingly anxious to 
receive his cousin, and would wish either to be his companion this 
morning as he explored the beauties of the to^, or to conduct him 
at once to St. Hilaire, before luncheon, to embrace his aunt. 

Meanwhile, when Gilbert had finished, Baptiste left the clearing 
of the breakfast-table to Madeline, and proceeded to do the honors 
of the house by conducting the young guest, for his amusement, 
from room to room. 

There was, first, the drawing-room of the marquis to be explored 
— a beautiful reception saloon with Aubusson carpet, and panels of 
Gobelin tapestry, and turquois hangings, and Venetian chandeliers, 
which, as Baptiste boasted, held on many festive occasions during 
the winter innumerable wax-lights, and glittered like the sun. 

There was the marquis’ business-room, comfortable and unpre- 
tentious, to be seen; there was the dinning-hall, with polished floor 
and high, open fire-place, lighted on great occasions by huge lamps 
held aloft by huge black figures in the corners; there was the little 
round room, where the sun poured in, bright and cheery, furnished 
with simplicity and in English style, which the family used daily 
as a dining-room; and, lastly, there was an exquisite little chamber, 
into which they entered through an arched doorway with a beauti- 
ful carved scroll running around it, on which was woven a wreath 
of violets picked out in colors delicate and bright. 

“This,” cried Baptiste, triumphantly, “is the violet room, the 
boudoir of Madame la Marquise.” 

Gilbert glanced in admiration as he entered, and smiled also with 
much amusement to himself as he thought that a sister of his mother 
actually occupied such a room. 

It was violet everywhere. The walls were paneled with silk of a 
delicate shade, on which the cipher and coronet of the marquis were 


THE SUH-MAID. 


20 


worked in silver, with the leaves and flowers twining round tlie let- 
ters of her name; soft and cloudy curtains ot lace, lined also with 
violet, hung over the windows, and toned and harmonized the whole 
coloring ot the room. 

The furnishings were small and dainty; and on every part of them, 
with a’ taste that was decidedly French— on carpet, table-cover, cab- 
inets, and chairs— were embroidered or inlaid the monogram, coronet, 
and woven wreath, proclaiming them, with all their costly beauty, 
to have been made and destined specially for the place they occu- 
pied, and for the owner of the room. 

“The violet boudoir,” as Baptiste repeated. “Prepared for 
Madame la Marquise by monsieur himself when he came here, as a 
surprise upon her day of f^te. There is one just like it at the chateau 
on the hill. A pretty tribute, is it not, to madame and her name, 
Sare Geelbert? Ah, I assure you, you will see of all the flowers at 
St. Hilaire the Yiolette is always the queen.” 

Gilbert laughed merrily as he applauded the graceful turning of 
Baptiste’s compJiment, and thought to himself what an oddity an 
English valet would be who discoursed in such flowery style; and 
then, having amply admired the beautiful little apartment, they re- 
turned to the gmoking-.room, and Gilbert lighted hi^ morning cigar. 

Baptiste wisely took this as a hint for his dismissal, and he de- 
parted, after fidgeting about for several extra and unnecessary min- 
utes to assure himself that monsieur was provided in all his require- 
ments, and that Madeline had left no part of her dusting and sweep- 
ing undone; and then Gilbert conveyed himself and his cigar to the 
window. 

He felt in most gleeful spirits; his mood of the night before had 
quite evaporated; he was full of anticipation of enjoyment; and all 
these pleasant sensations seemed somehow to come over him irre- 
sistibly, simply from the influence of things external as they sur- 
rounded him in this morning light. 

The mountain view, as he leaned now from Morton’s balcony, 
was far less mystic and soul -stirring than it had seemed to him 
wrapped in the silvery moonlight the night before; but there was a 
wonderful gladness in the prospect; it was essentially what the 
French call Hant. 

The foreground of the sloping coteaux seemed positively to smile, 
the sunlight touching here and there a sweep of brilliant verdure, or, 
again, a bank of wood, all golden and amber with the early autumn 
tints. Soft rising columns of blue smoke curled into the still air 
from chateaux, villas, and peaceful peasant homes, of which many 
stood on the green slopes, and nestled in the sheltering "woods of 
those rich and beautiful hills. 

In the near foreground lay the river, the Gave, and the village 
JuranQon, the sun’s rays tipping the roofs and churches, and draw- 
ing them out into strong relief against the green or russet setting 
that sloped behind. From the church tower of Gelos rang out the 
midday chimes, sweeping down the valley with soft, musical echo, 
and reaching Gilbert mellowed by the distance, floating toward him 
on the sweet breezes of the mountain air. 

The heavy rain of the day before had fallen, as he now saw, in 
the first coating of snow upon the highest mountains, and the Pic 


THE SUH-MAID. 


21 

da Midi d’Ossau reared its proud crest, white and silvery and won- 
derful in brightness, against the deep-blue sky. Over the soft gray 
hues of the lower mountains, across their summits, and along their 
precipitous sides, darkness and sunshine seemed to chase each other 
with the wonderful effect which forms the chief fascination of that 
bewitching view ; for, on such a morning, light and shade, sunshine 
and shadow, with ceaseless and fantastic change, play and dance 
continually there, over mountain and valley, over distance and fore- 
ground, over verdure and snow. 

Long before Gilbert had thought of wearying of it at all, or 
felt that he had half exhausted the enjoyment of the mountain 
view, while the mysterious longing was still strong upon him 
to go there, to cross the valley, to skim the lower summits, and 
to reach somehow, anyhow, the snowy shaft that seemed piercing 
the highest sky, a sudden noise reached his ears. First the pealing 
of the huge gate-bell, then the clattering of horses’ hoofs, and the 
roll of a carriage in the court-yard below; the hasty banging of 
doors, the tread of rapid footsteps springing up the outer stairs; the 
voices loud and cheery, mingling young and old; and finally, before 
he had time to fling away hia cigar and turn from the window, the 
door opened, and cousin and uncle simultaneously burst into the 
room. / 

Morton — an §it^ed Morton from what he remembered at Erie’s 
Lynn — sprung^ toward him with a cry of welcome, with a smiling 
countenance and outstretched hands; and before Gilbert had nearly 
finished ^Hinging them in a warm and eager gi’asp, the old marquis 
had caijfght him up, enveloped him in an enormous fat, soft em- 
brace, that suggested suffocation in a feather-bed, and, much to 
Gilb^jrt’s discomfiture, had kissed him loudly upon each cheek. He 
wag very much put out, but managed to right himself, gaining his 
eouilibrium, and disengaging himself from his uncle’s embrace, 
Vhile Morton clasped his hand again, and continued the reiteration 
<ff his welcome and delight. 

. “ Dear fellow! 1 am so glad to see you at last! Ah, you faithless 
/ Gilbert ! how many years is it — ten— since you were to come to St. 
Hilaire the very next spring?” 

“ Never mind,” exclaimed the marquis, in very broken English, 
differing widely from his son’s, which was perfectly correct and 
pure. “ Never mind, he has come now: so yx will only welconnJ 
him, and not upbraid him with the past.” 

“lam very glad to come, at all events,” began Gilbert. 

“Ah, that is right,” broke in the marquis; “and you will be 
glad to stay, 1 hope, and sorry, very sorry, to go, when, some day, a 
long time hence, we consent to part with you!” 

“ Thank you! thank you!” cried Gilbert, warmly, “ thank 5 "ou 
for your welcome indeed!” 

“ Welcome! Of course we welcome you, a thousand times, my 
dear boy! my nice, handsome, fine young fellow! nephew of mv 
Violette! I am ten times delighted to welcome you to St. Hilaire!^’ 

“Thanks, thanks,” repeated Gilbert; and then he edged a few 
steps away for the marquis’ eyes were glistening with effusive 
affection, and he looked a little bit as if he would fain, in his cor- 
diality, re-envelop his nephew, and embrace him again, and Gilbert 


22 


THE SUH-MAID. 


did not like it. He edged away a little, and contemplated his uncle 
with no small curiosity and amusement, as the marquis sunk into a 
chair, fanned himself with a large pocket-handkerchief, and re- 
gained slowly his coolness and composure. 

The Marquis de St. Hilaire had all the remains of the good looks 
which had captivated Violet Morton in those sunny da5's of thirty 
years ago. He had the brightest possible twinkle in his eyes, and 
the softest conceivable tones in his mellow voice. He had good 
features, a fine presence, a courtliness of manner that was wonderful 
to behold, and a genuine bonhomie of disposition that made life 
pleasant to himself and everybody about him. Alas! the symmetry 
of his handsome features and the grace of his stalwart frame were 
hidden— encompassed and enveloped by an amount of voluminous 
obesity' that was to himself a source of pretended, and to his fond 
marquise of most genuine, regret. 

^ “ Ah!” she often said, “ Leon, my darling, you were once beau- 
tiful; but now, helas! you are nothing but a ‘ bon papa!’ ” 

He was very like a huge, good-natured Plon-plon, for his features 
were of the type Napoleonistic — and so were his sentiments. “ The 
Violet,” as he repeated often, held his allegiance alike for his home 
at St. Hilaire and for the throne of France. 

Morton, Vicomte de St. Hilaire (or ” Morrtong-g,” as his French 
friends called him, with that energy of the r an& faint echo of the g 
which it is impossible to transcribe into English), was as pleasant a 
young cousin, in appearance, character, and manner, as any one 
who had traveled, like Gilbert, some distance to seek him could wish 
to find. Slight, straight, energetic, and about the medium height, 
shorter by some inches than Gilbert, he was many shades darker in 
complexion and coloring. His eyes and hair and his pointed' mus- 
tache were all nut-brown, the eyes clear, bright, and cordial, and 
the smile frequent and sweet. 

He had few national characteristics of any kind, either English or 
French. ^ He inclined toward the former in taste, toward the lattc^r 
in -disposition. He had long employed Gilbert’s tailor, ridden Ec- 
glisk horses, boasted an English groom, and gloried in broad-toed 
boots; but, on the other side, to outbalance these Britannic tenden-\ 
cies, he had a passionate^ love of his home and his mountains that ) 
was Bearnais, with a sensibility to, and enjoyment of, all the external 
softness and graces of life that proclaimed him Southern and French. 

He ^ as fiance, as we have gathered already from Baptiste’s refer- 
ence, as he and Gilbert had walked up the hill together from the 
station; and his W'as not to be merely a French marriage of conven- 
ience, but a genuine love affair, of which Gilbert was destined to 
hear much, and in which his interests would be often and genuinely 
concerned before his visit to the Pyrenees was over. 

All this we may know ; but Gilbert had not time either to observd' 
or to discover much personally about his cousin before the marquis' 
and Baptiste combined to hurry their departure for St. Hilaire. 

stop to explore the town to-day, 1 think,’’ said 
Morton; shall we, Gilbert? You will have many opportunities of 
doing It all again.” 

‘‘ Certainly not!” exclaimed the marquis. ‘‘ Your aunt does lan- 
guish to behold you, my nephew. She pines to embrace you; she is 


THE SUN-ilAID. 


23 


impatient to receive you at last at her liome. Come, let us go at 
once, Morton. We will reach St. Hilaire for the English lunch, 
and Gilbert can see the Pau celebrities another day. ’ ’ 

“ 1 am dying to be oft,” said Gilbert. “ 1 have been looking at 
these mouniains all the morning, and wishing for a patent flying- 
machine or a serviceable balloon. 1 am longing to get to the other 
side of the valley, and 1 cannot say that 1 saw much that was at- 
tractive over here.” 

“ Well, let us start, then, at once,” said Morton. “ Come 
along!” And down-stairs they went without further delay. 

In the court-yard was the marquis’ phaeton — a neat little Lon- 
don-built stanhope, with a handsome pair of chestnuts champing 
their bits with impatience to be off. Behind it stood a tax-cart, drawn 
by a huge mule, and driven by a peasant in the orthodox blouse and 
beret. 

Gilbert’s luggage was hoisted on to this, and Baptiste, scrambling 
up behind, sat down backward with much solemnity on the highest 
portmanteau, and folded his arms with an air as if no dignity could 
be wanting to this, or any position while he was there to impart it. 

The marquis with wonderful agility sprung to his driving-box; 
Gilbert, as invited, look the seat beside him;" Morton jumped up 
with the smart OToom behind ; and off they went out of the court- 
yard, along the flue du Lycee, bowling through the Place Gramont, 
down the hill, across the bridge, and away over the sunny road 
toward the sloping hills. 

It was a charming drive, for the mountain air, cool and autum- 
nal, tempered the fervor of the sun. The way lay through rich 
glades of wood and vineyard and pastures, all .green, soft, meadowy, 
and luxuriant as the valleys of Devon, and surpassing in beauty 
that richest corner of England, because the pics and snowy shoul- 
ders of the mountains rose ever in the dreamy distance beyond. 

It was an amusing drive too, for it was market-day across the 
Gave at Pau, and the road was covered with an endless train of 
laden ox-carts, with mules and donkeys gayly decked in Spanish 
harness, ridden by men and women indiscriminately, and by old and 
young. 

An extraordinary confusion of sounds rose from the tinkling of 
the ox-bells and the loud, jabbering voices of the drivers, squab- 
bling together in noisy Bearnaise, or exhorting their oxen in caress- 
ing and beseeching tones; and as the oxen often turned obstinate 
and stood still, it was curious to see their drivers seize them for- 
cibly by the horns and drag them from the middle of the ciowded 
road into a place of safety on the sideway. Indeed, the medley of 
men, donkeys, old women, and vehicles, straggling along the road, 
and more often across it, was a spectacle full of characteristics, both 
rustic and local. 

The marquis drove at full speed, holding the reins tightly in both 
hands, and most dexterously did he dodge in and out, round the ox- 
carts and across from side to side of the road, narrowly escaping at 
one point an old woman and her donkey; scattering a lierd of goats 
in fihy directions at another; seeming to threaten men and animals 
with instant destruction, and seeming always to peril his carriage 
.and horses, to say nothing of his own neck and those of his fiiend's. 


THE SUN-MAID. 


21 

Nothing: happened, however, the carriage went smoothly on. He 
was accustomed to all of them— peasants and cattle and donkeys — 
and they to him. He shouted, harangued, and scolaed, always with 
extraordinary effect; and when his voice died away in the distance 
as his phaeton bowled on, Baptiste, in the mule-cart, took up the 
thread where his master left it; and, having the advantage of sitting 
backward, he could execrate men and oxen and old women quite to 
his satisfaction as they stretched far behind him along the road. 

About five miles they drove on in this way, sometimes on the 
level, following the rippling courses of the stream; now breasting at 
full trot a sudden rise over a sloping coteau; again dipping into the 
valley beyond, until at length, crossing the steep shoulder of one 
vine-covered hill, they seemed to leave Pau and the rushing Gave, 
and the lower summits of the coteaux suddenly behind them, and 
they came upon a grand new opening view reaching far into the 
Pyrenees, The Chateau de St. Hilaire lay among clustering woods, 
surrounded by soft, undulating sward, just in the foreground below 
them. 

The lofty turrets and the high windows of St. Hilaire might catch 
the prospect on the Pau side, and reach to the plains that lay flat 
and far beyond; but the frontage of the chateau looked southward, 
commanding the pics and ranges of the mountains, and facing the 
full glory and radiance of the Spanish sun. 

Beneath groups of fine old oak-trees they bowled up the avenue, 
dipping and rising a dozen times as they traversed narrow ravines, 
and crossed the rustic bridges that spanned the stream. They drove 
through a shady beech-wood, and rolled softly over the golden car- 
pet of fallen leaves which autumn and the mountain breezes had 
strewed richly at their feet, and finally they shot round a sharp cor- 
ner, in at the private entrance, and up a gentle slope between brill- 
iant parterres of flowers, clusters of rose-bushes, and banks of vel- 
vet sward. The marquis brought them swinging up to the door at a 
fine pace with immense flourish and a great deal of air. A cleverly 
performed piece of driving it had certainly been, for which he was 
immensely well pleased with himself. 

“ There now!” he exclaimed, as he scrambled down with assist- 
ance after Gilbert had alighted. ” There, five miles: hill and dale, 
and done sharply in fifty minutes, oxen and old women and all! 
What you say? I can drive? Like an Englishman? Yes, just sol 
Capital ! Come in, mj’- dear boy, come in. ” 

Gilbert was lingering a moment, and looking about him with ad- 
miration and enjoyment; but when JMorton had sprung from his 
back seat in the phaeton, the marquis bustled enormously and hur- 
ried them both in. Gilbert must be presented to madame without 
any delay. , 

They passed now through an antique porch, through a mighty 
door into a large hall, handsome, beautifully proportioned, vaulted, 
and richly carved ; and there they encountered a group of servants 
in picturesque liveries. Lackeys they were of the French rococo 
school — no one would have dreamed of calling them ” footmen,” so 
little had they an air of John Thomas, and so much of Huy Bias. 
They were hastening to the entrance at the sound of Monsieur le 
Marquis’ approach. But he was too quick for them. They were 


THE SUI^-MAID. 25 

only in time to stand back in order, and bow with ceremony as he 
trotted heavily past them in much hurry and excitement, and 
crossed the hall. 

One man threw open a door; a second in the plain dress of a 
chamberlain pronounced the marquis’ and Gilbert’s name; and in 
ran the old gentleman, followed by his son and nephew, through a 
large ante-room, under a thick festooned curtain, and into the draw’-- 
ing-room, where, in the recess of a window, bending over her broid- 
ery-frame, his “ Yiolette,” the marquise, sat alone. 

‘‘Here he is! at last we have caught him!” shouted the marquis 
in French; and then he laughed immoderately, and shook his huge 
sides with delight, while Gilbert came forward, and his aunt rose, 
pushed her frame away, came quickly to meet him, and with an ex- 
clamation of pleasure put up her hands upon his shoulders, and 
close round his neck. “Dear child! dear child!” she murmured, 
“ thrice welcome!” and she kissed him softly on forehead and cheek. 

It was impossible to realize for a moment — as she stood back from 
him to look up into his face, as he could then survey her from head 
to foot— -impossible to realize that this was his mother’s sister. The 
recollection of his mother shot across him for a moment — chill, 
stern, and even to him so undemonstrative; the recollection of her 
tall, unbending figure; of her iron-gray braided hair; of the lines of 
age in her grave countenance; and of the rigorous simplicity in the 
style and materials of her dress. And here was her only sister — that 
renegade of thirty years ago — very little her junior, and as unlike 
her as two extremes could be. 

The marquis was even taller than his mother, but in her graceful 
figure there was no approach to anything austere or grim. Her cheek 
was pale, but smooth and downy — the lines somehow softened 
away; her hair clustered thickly over her forehead, frizzed and 
feathery, fine as spun silk and white as driven snow. Her eyes were 
sparkling, and her radiant smile was full of happiness and fun. Her 
dress was of some dark shade, trimmed archly, and hung to perfec- 
tion; across her shoulders she wore a fichu of fine lace, and n ]\[arie 
Antoinette cap crowned the wonderful arrangement of her snowy 
hair. There was no attempt at youth in any way, but certainly 
there was the substitute of most artistic perfection in all the harmo- 
nies of confessed age. People were fond of comparing her to “ an 
old picture,” not knowing very clearly what they meant, but some- 
how because the idea does float vaguely abroad that old masters ad- 
mired exquisite laces, soft harmony of color, graceful lines in the 
draping of a costume, in the folds of a fichu, in the setting of a head- 
dress; and if this was indeed the case, then Madame la Marquise de 
St, Hilaire was certainl}’- “ like an old picture,” for sbe shared all 
these tastes with them. 

“ Dear child!” she murmured again to Gilbert, in answer to his 
“ How are you, aunt? 1 am very glad to see you at last.” 

“ Poor Anna’s boy!” she continued; “ poor Anna! And so you 
have come at last! Well, I am glad to see you, dear; yes, very 
glad!” 

“ And I am delighted to be here.” 

“ Sit down, dear child, sit down here by me. Go aw'ay, Lu; go 


26 - 


THE SUN -MAID. 


away, Fanfan; make room for our guest, my jewels — and, oh! Mor- 
ton cher, lift up this mountain of work.’' 

A white Maltese and a tiny English terrier woke up with indig- 
nation as she spoke, and crept ofl: the sofa disconsolate and very un- 
willing, as she swept them 2 :ently away, while Morton laughed and 
came forward to do her bidding, and to carry off an armful of soft, 
bright-colored wools that had been piled in confusion by her side. 
Then she sat down and drew Gilbert on to the sofa. She took his 
hand and patted it gently with her own, which were white and small 
and well-shapen, and sparkling with a lavish and costly profusion of 
brilliant rings; and he looked at her still in unutterable amazement, 
thinking first that “ surely no fellow ever had such an aunt!” and, 
conclusively, that (though an old woman without doubt) she was-— 
young, old, or middle-aged— almost the loveliest woman he had ever 
seen. 

The marquis had thought so for many a day, and he liked a great 
deal of her attention for his fascinating and most amiable self; even 
a handsome young nephew, though newly acquired, must not absorb 
her for more than a very few minutes at a time; so he struck in with: 
” Well, Violette, and so we have got him; and what do you think 
of him now he is here, eh? Ha— ha!” And then he rubbed his fat 
hands together, and laughed again with that good-humored and 
quite purposeless laugh of his which he found suitable to almost any 
occasion. Then he had much to tell — of his feat of driving, of Gil- 
bert’s admiration of his power as a ‘ ‘ Jehu, ’ ’ of the time they had taken 
to bowl over to the Rue du Lycee, and the proportionate rapidity 
with which they had come back; and his wife answered him with 
sunny smiles and sympathetic glances, until at length he departed, 
happy in considering himself equal to the best whip in the Four-in- 
hand Club, and possessed of the loveliest wife in 4he province of 
Berne. 

Then the remaining three sat talking. 

” Dear child,” as the marquise, continued to call Gilbert, ” so you 
made a nice journey, and you like the country, and you are pleased 
to be with us all here?” 

” I am delighted to be with you,” said Gilbert; “ but 1 hated the 
journey, and yesterday I did not at all like the place.” 

” Ah, that was because it rained,” rejoined Morton. “ Baptiste 
told me it poured when you came into Pau. ’ ’ 

” It did. It was horrid. 1 thought it most fearfully dismal. ” 

“Ah! but now?” exclaimed the marquise, “ you like it really? 
you like it? Will you not say so? You must — you must!” 

“Yes, of course I do. 1 think it is beautiful— up here at St. 
Hilaire especially.” 

“Ah! good boy! dear child! I knew you would. And you will 
love it, Gilbert, before we let you go.” 

He laughed a little, and Morton went on : 

” It must rain now and then, you know, and a great deal too, else 
how should we have the green trees and grass ? The sun is so hotj 
you see, Gilbert; and yet we pique ourselves on our vegetation. 
Even in England, 1 do not think 1 remember any finer verdure than 
we can show you here. ’ ’ 

” No, certainly not. It is wonderfully luxuriant and beautiful.” 


THE SUH-MAID. 


27 


“ And of course,” continued the marquise, “ that must come of 
rain. See in Provence or Languedoc, on the other side of France, 
anywhere, everywhere, where the sun strikes and it is dry and cloud- 
less, how the meadow-land is arid and bare; while here— look at our 
lawn and at our roses, Gilbert, and at the green hues of the acacia- 
tree!” 

” Yes, it is wonderful. We have no fresher green at Erie’s Lynn 
than that,” said Gilbert. ” 1 think 1 shall like this country im- 
mensely, aunt.” 

Like ! ’ ’ exclaimed the marquise, enthusiastically. “No one likes 
the Coteaux of the Pyrenees. Either you do not know them, and 
are unconscious of them, and indifferent to them, or you know 

them, have lived on them, and love them!” 

“ I think it is very beautiful,” said Gilbert. “lam sure 1 should 
be fond of the countr}’ if it were my home. ’ ’ 

“ And you must be fond of it because it is mine, dear child, and 
Morton’s, and because we mean to make you so happy here that you 
will never wish to leave us, and go back, when you must go, with 
sorrow. Shall we be able to manage it, Morton cher? Do vou 
think we shall?” 

“We shall try, at all events— and apropos, 1 wonder what Gilbert 
would want to do now? Will you come and see your room? And 
after luncheon we might have a cigar, and a stroll about the place, 
and look at the dogs and hunters.” 

“Do! take him away! Dogs and cigars and horses— of course 
those are the sort of things that amuse two boys like you; and Mor- 
ton has plenty to show you. Make yourself at home, dear, and lead 
exactly the life that pleases you; and walk or ride, or anything else 
you fancy, just when or where you like. Morton will show you all 
his ways of life, and as long as you stay among us 1 am sure every- 
thing that is his is yours. I think I can speak so much for him, and 
1 know I can for Leon — the marquis, I mean— and myself. IVIake 
yourself as happy as you can, dear boy — and,” she continued, put- 
ting up her soft fingers to pat his cheek, “ when you have an idle 
moment or a lazy moment, just come back to your stupid old aunt, 
and lounge away an hour in the corner of her sofa. You will always 
be welcome, and you won’t mind Fanfan and Lu.” 

“ 1 am sure I shall often avail myself of that last permission,” 
said Gilbert, gallantly, smiling at the pretended humility and paihos 
with which she depreciated her ow'n society and herself. 

“ Will you, dear? That’s a good boy! Come as often as you like, 

then, and tell me all the English gossip and scandal j^ou can remem- 
ber. It will not be too old for me, at all events, for 1 have not heard 
any for many a day. And now you are dying, 1 know, to be oil 
together. Give me another kiss, you great big fellow, and go away. ’ ’ 
Gilbert blushed a little as he obeyed this request, bending his head 
that she might touch his forehead softly with her lips again. He 
was unaccustomed to the process, informal demonstrations of afltec- 
tion at unconventional times being unheard of at Erie’s Lynn. 

Morton, too, came close up to them now as the marquise stood, 
with her sparkling fingers on Gilbert’s shoulders, and, much to the 
latter’s astonishment, possessed himself of one of her pretty hands, .h 
raised it to his lips with deferential ceremony, and said, “Ah! 



THE SU^^'MAID. 


28 

maman clierie! I shall be jealous of the big cousin if you show him 
such favor as this.” 

” Bah!” she answered, laughing, but with a tender look in her 
eyes, as she turned them upon Morton. ” You may well be jealous. 
1 am pleased wdth this nephew of mine, and proud also. Look at 
him,” she continued, touching the points of his hair; ” how fair he 
is, and tall and clear-complexioned. A Deningharn all over, not a 
bit an Erie. And you, Morton, you brown fellow! go along to your 
Jeanne — your fiancee — fickle one! I am not a bit proud of you, and 
1 do not love you at all, at all, do I? you spoiled boy! Go away, 
both of 3’'ou, and leave Lu and Fanfan to sleep in peace. Never 
mind them, Gilbert; they will not growl at you after a little while, 
and they very seldom bite. Good-by!” 


CHAPTER 111. 

ST. HILIjLRE. 

In the afternoon the marquise went out driving; the marquis dis- 
appeared after his own concerns; and Morton took Gilbert into the 
gardens, across to the stables, and all over tlie house. 

The gardens were beautiful, sloping away on each side of the 
chateau, and losing themselves in deep, woody valleys where 
ornamental trees grew luxuriantly, and through -which winding paths 
led to the cool shades by the gurgling waters that ran in the lowest 
depth of each. 

The gardens were in the last glory of their autumn bloom, still 
brilliant with geraniums, verbenas, and roses, with magnificent 
hydrangeas, with the beautiful magnolia and the graceful shrinking 
mimosa, all blooming with a luxury of verdure and variety of deli- 
cate hue such as we see not in our chillier climes. 

Large forcing beds of lilies of the valley and of violets, white, 
purple, or rich and sweet-scented Parma, were being nurtured un- 
der a south wall with infinite care, all destined to bloom forth with 
luxury and abundance at the earliest breath of spring. In the long 
glass-houses and surrounding the garden the azalea and camellia 
ti-ees sloped in banks of intense* verdure, hiding under their velvet 
leaves countless buds that gave promise of a rich show of brilliant 
coloring in the winter months to come. 

Before March was over they would be banked against the house, 
in the open air, around the porch and windows, blooming luxuriantly, 
and unsheltered as the peony in an English June. Glass and hot 
house are little needed in a country where the purple grape ripens 
large and luxurious round the porch of the peasant’s cottage, and 
where the cherry and the plum trees form the hedges of the public 
way. 

From the flower garden they strolled on to the stables, where 
Morton’s hunters stood ready for the winter, when they would all 
move to Pan, for hunting and for gayety as well. 

Morton’s English groom was a native of Erie’s Lynn, and had 
been sent out from there some years ago to superintend the ecurw on 
the Pyrenees; and it amused Gilbert immensely to find how much. 


29 


THE SUN- MAID. 

at home he had grown, how accustomed to his Fi’ench surroundings 
and his Bearnais strappers, to whom he chattered volubly a curious 
stable, jargon, in which the Sussex burr mingled oddly with hi? 
peculiar modification of the dialect of Bearn. The establishment, 
however, was admirable, and the horses stood, as Gilbert observed^ 
“ in as neat a stable as he could wish to see.” 

There w^ere three hunters in capital condition, looking, as he re- 
marked, ” very fit and quite ready for work,” and there was a steady- • 
looking old cover hack, glorying in the name of Dinah, whom Mo'r- 
ton exhibited with especial pride. 

“ She is as tame as amold house-dog,” he said, as he patted her 
lovingly, and she turned to rub her nose against his shoulder. ” 1 
have ridden her for yearn, Gilbert, to the cover-side, and up and down 
the coteaux here. 1 have no doubt she spent most ‘ of her life in 
Rotten Row before 1 got her; for I bought her of a game old Briton 
who shipped her out here by Bordeaux, and rode her, for constitu- 
tional benefit, up and down the soft bit in the Allee de Morlaas daily 
for a whole season. I used to be exercising my hunters there on 
the off-days, and fell in love with her; and when the month of May 
came, I found the old fellow glad enough to be spared the money of 
her passage home, and so I bought her. Is she not a beauty, eh?” 

” She is a dear old beast,” said Gilbert, smoothing down the pony’s 
fat sides, with a familiar toucli, which she acl^owledged on her 
side by a plunge at Morton’s coat-sleeve and a whisk of her short, 
docked tail. 

‘‘Dear old pony!” Morton continued. “Will you standstill? 
"Y ou can ride her, you know, Gilbert, as much as ever you like. She 
is the best for the country over here. The hunters are too fresh to 
be pleasant for jogging up and down these steep hills. Joe and I 
exercise them in a paddock I have made down in the hollows, and 
so keep all their energies ready for the real work on the other side.’' 

“ How on earth can you hunt in this sort of country?” exclaimed 
Gilbert, suddenly. “ Anything I have seen yet would be impossible 
ground — worse than the toughest bit of Irish hill and heather 1 ever 
scrambled over.” 

“ Ah! but you have not seen the other side — away beyond Pau, on 
the flats of the Landes; there are lots of capital runs to be had. A 
fine wide stretch of country, with nothing to bother you but little 
ditches, and bits of crumbly bank and wall. You soon get accus- 
tomed to it, and 1 assure you we have capital sport; have we not, 
Joe?” 

“ Well, my lord!” responded Joe, who always insisted on address- 
ing Morton in this style describing him as “ the Wiscount.” “ 1 
don’t say, of course, as how it is like the ’unting of the shires: and 
Sir Gilbert must not expect to get runs with us such as he’d ave 
with the Pytehley, or on t’other side the country with the Dook of 
Beaufort’s hunt; but if as how he’ll be moderate in his expectations, 

I think, my lord, we’ll manage to show him as pretty a piece of 
sport now and again in the course of the winter as he might see wuth 
any ordinary English pack. And that 1 can say for the ’unt of Pau, 
Sir Gilbert, and that I icilV’ 

“I have no doubt of it,” said Gilbert. “But, somehow, the 
climate and the style of things about here do not suggest hunting to 


30 


THE ^UN-MAID. 


my mind; hard riding under this sunshine must be tough work— it 
does not feel like it. But still, Morton, these three animals look 
like business, and would do a good ‘day’s work for you in any 
shire.” 

“ They would, Sir Gilbert. And they have sometimes got work to 
do,” continued Joe: “them stony banks, and blind ditches, and 
hedgy walls about the flats across there, need a wide-awake rider 
and a tidy ’orse, 1 assure you, sir. They get lots of croppers, some 
of them queer ’untsmen who turns out with us. They jog along 
quite ’appy sometimes with the ladies o’ a morning, Sir Gilbert, and 
show up as smart as a gentleman rider o’ Astley’s Circus, with their 
butting-holes and the tight spring in the back o’ their vermilion 
coats; but I a’ seen a one or two o’ them crawling ’ome a weny 
battered spectacle o’ an evening, sir, when 1 would not like to ’ave 
’ad the clay-piping o’ their white breeches to do over again, or the 
blacking o’ their French-polished boots, let alone that I'don’t think 
a second-hand purchaser. Sir Gilbert, o’ old 'unting ’ats would ’a 
given sixpence for the curly-rimmed tiles o’ theirs, smashed up as 
they was.” a 

Gilbert and Morton both burst into a fit of laughter at Joe’s irony 
and venom. 

“A terrible and most graphic description, Joe. But 1 should 
think time three "v^ould carry you steadily, Morton. How did you 
pick them up?” 

“ They are always to be picked up here,” said Morton. “ Men 
bring them out, and then grudge to take them back again, just as 
in old Dinah’s case. That is an Irishman, that big-boned fellow; I 
call him Mike. A man rode him here one season, and 1 kept my 
eye upon him many a day when he led the hunt. He was only a 
four-year old then, and 1 have had two capital winters with him 
since. The other pair of darlings 1 got only last spring — they are 
sisters; Minna and Brenda mother christened them. Beauties, are 
they not? Such a perfect brown, everj" inch of them, except the black 
forehead stars. Well, a fellow brought them out about Christmas- 
time last year, and swaggered enormously with them in a little mail 
phaeton. He was all over the place; giving himself out as a great 
swell, and taking the shine out of everybody. Of couise, in about 
a month he knocked up — proved a humbug, and totally impecuni- 
ous. He could not i^ay his hotel bill, and so his smart little turnout 
was seized. Joe suspected him from the first, j’ou must know, and 
used to wink in the most diabolical manner as the fellow' sat in great 
magnificence of a band day on the Place Royale, holding the reins of 
these pretty sisters with the tips of his lilac kids ; and before it was 
well knowm about the town and clubs that our smart friend was in- 
solvent, Joe had stepped in and bought up the pair for me. He ad- 
t vised me to try them in the saddle, and 1 did. ‘They are perfect for 
a light-weight, and 1 have hunted them gently very often. Time 
enough to put you in harness again when you are steady old ladies, 
and on the w'ane, is it not, my pets? Quiet, 3Iinna! So, Brenda! 
Quiet, mon bijou, quiet.” 

“ They are perfect beauties, 1 must say,” said Gilbert. 

“1 am afraid,” continued Morton, “ they are too light to carry 
you comfortably, Gilbert, but you shall have Mike the whole of this 


THE SUi^-MAID. 


31 


■winter entirely for yourself; he will bear sixteen stone easily; and 1 
have no doubt Joe will ferret us out -another hunter nearly as good, 
and as well up to your weight, before the season comes on.” 

“ ]\ty dear fellow,” exclaimed Gilbert, “ thanks a thousand times! 
But 1 am not going to take up my abode heie, Morton; it is only 
the end of September. 1 fancy 1 shall be back in the old country by 
the time the hunting sets fairly in.” 

“Ah,” replied Morton, smiling, “we wull see about that. We 
don’t mean to let you aways# easily, now we have caught you, mon 
cousin: and, besides, do not decide anything till you have tried us 
all. Some people have found Pau, you know, a very difficult place 
from which to go away; but we shall see. Come out now, Gilbert; 
the sun is setting already. How we have idled away the ahernoon! 
and I have lots more to show you. Come along!” 

The stable formed one side of a neat court-yard, of which coach- 
house and servants’ apartments and a very showy harness-room filled 
up the other three. A wide gate hung across the entrance ; and just 
as they reached this, the marquise’s barouche turned slowly in, 
drawn* by a splendid pair of dark bays, and driven by a fat coach- 
man, of whom the only insignia of his nationality, beyond his gray- 
hued, good-tempered Bearnais face, were the colored cockade that 
adorned his hat and the cut of the epaulets on his shoulders. Ex- 
cept this, the carriage and its appointments were dark, plain, and 
handsome as could be. The marquise’s coronet and monogram 
were visible on the panels ; for her husband liked to see them em- 
blazoned everywhere, though they were by no means remarkable or 
obtrusive. 

“ My mother has come in, I see,” said Morton. “We will go 
round and join her presently; she will be taking exercise on the 
terrace in behalf of Fanfan and Lu. But come down this way a 
little first. See what a good view of the mountains opens from the 
back of the court-yard; and here is my paddock down below. Look, 
1 have three promising young animals in there.” 

He leaned his arms on the top rail of the paddock-gate as he spoke, 
and Gilbert, full of interest — keener, indeed, for the paddock and its 
inmates than for the view— leaned beside him. 

“ Very handsome colts,” he said. “ That gray one has a splendid 
shoulder.” 

“ Yes. I think they will turn out well; Joe is such a famous fel- 
low with horses. 1 have never ceased to be grateful to you, Gil- 
bert, for sending him out.” 

“ The favor was as much to him as to 3 ^ou,” said Gilbert. “ He 
seems perfectly happy, and looks most ridiculous, but very much at 
home.” 

“ Oh, he gets on very well, and I often laugh as 1 come suddenly 
to the yard sometimes and overhear him talking Bearnais or French; 
it is wonderful how he has picked them up. What do you think of 
that little bay, Gilbert? She is three years turned this autumn, and 
comes of a capital stock. Joe and 1 think of entering her for the 
flat race at the spring meeting this year; but what do 3 "ou think?’/ 

“ Race’” exclaimed Gilbert. “ Do you go in for that too down 
here?” 

“ Don’t we! AVait till you see. AVe do, indeed, go in for it, and 


THE SUX-MAID. 


32 

a good deal too mucli so for a good many of us, I can tell you, but 
that is not my line, you know, except in a very amateur way. The 
flat race is for gentlemen’s hunters, and 1 should like my Brillante 
to proclaim herself the best at Pau, that is all. Oh, the races are 
great fun, and about as pretty a sight in some ways as you could 
wish to see.” 

“ Only fancy!” said Gilbert. “ How odd it seems! Racing and 
hunting were about the last things I thought of in coming down 
here. 1 had no idea you were such a sporting community. ” 

” Oh, we are everything! Wait till you have seen us all; we will 
astonish you, 1 dare say,, in more ways than one. But what do you 
think of the little Ally?” 

“1 think she is uncommonly pretty,” said Gilbert. “Trim as 
could be, every way, and with a very graceful head. She ‘ looks 
like going, ’ too, Morton. That is an easy, swinging canter of hers. 

I fancy she could go at any pace. ’ ’ 

“ 1 believe she would. We will have her out one morning with 
the saddle on, and let Joe try her a bit. He is a capital little light- 
weight, and is very eager about the race. And now I think we have 
pretty well done the stables, and may as well go round to the other 
side of the house. But look a moment, Gilbert, is not that a glori- 
ous view? Look at the snow now with that red light upon it. I 
am very fond of this old gate; I often smoke a cheroot here to look 
at the sunset and watch the colls scampering in the field. I declare 
1 think they like it too, they always get so frisky on a fine evening, 
and you can hardly get them in. Look! is not that fine, where the 
;pwsVim up into the crimson sky?” 

“It is splendid,” said Gilbert; and so it was. The mountains 
had the flush of the evening upon them now, and the shadows had 
deepened, and the lights were golden down in the wood}^ valleys 
below, 

“ These mountains are glorious!” said Gilbert, “ How 1 long to 
explore them ! Can one not go and scramble about in the snows ? I 
should like to get to the top of that fine fellow throwing his head up 
into the clouds away there. ” 

“ The Pic du Midi,” said Morton. “ No, it is too late in the year 
for that; you must wait for the sping; then we will make lots of 
ascensions, as they say here, and explore as many mountains and- 
passes as yoii like. You must see the waterfalls, too — the Gavarnie 
and all the rest, and you must seek the Eaux Chaudes, and the Eaux 
Bonnes and Argeles, and the lakes of Artouste and Orredon and 
Seculeijo, and many more besides. Oh, you will have plenty to do . 
in the exploring line if you will only have patience, but we cannot let 
you go off among the winter snow^s. ’ ’ 

“One could look forever at this view!” exclaimed Gilbert, im- 
pulsively, fired with a sudden enthusiasm of enjoyment. 

“Yes,” said Morton, taking out his little, dainty, embroidered 
case, “ provided always one has a cigar. Hd’e, take one; there is 
something in this sort of evening that suggests to m}’^ mind tobacco. 
There-—! thoroughly enjoy it now. That snowy background is 
splendid, and I am very iond of the comfortable foreground of 
habitations also. I am essentially a sociable being, Gilbert; 1 like 
the feeling that one has neighbors all close about.” 




THE SUN- MAID. 


33 


*‘Tes; wliat quantities tliere are! Who lives in alh these houses? 
I am sure we could count the smokes of a dozen on these different 
iitlle hills.” 

“ Yes, there are quite as many. They are all chateaux— neighbors 
'—different people — families large and small. Look ! that is my lit- 
lile Jeanne’s house there, away over the shoulder of the furthest 
<ooteau. Do you see? where the green bit of slopiog bank comes in 
above the oak-woods, and where the smoke is rising from a lot of 
chimneys. You must be introduced, Gilbert, to little Jeanne.” 

“ Y^es; I am looking forward with interest and curiosity to the 
introduction, 1 assure you.” 

Well, you will have the opportunity to-morrow night; we are to 
have a dinner party. 1 wonder, by-the-bye, who are coming alto- 
gether; 1 must ask my mother when we go in. I know Jeanne is, 
but 1 forgot to inquire about anybody else.” 

'‘A dinner-party!” exclaimed Gilbert. 

“ Yes; we are always having them here. Just the neighbors, you 
know-, the people round, apd a few, perhaps, from Pau, and little 
Jeanne, and her fathel* and mother, of course, and I dare say her 
eldest sister will come, and ] should not wonder if we had the Baron 
Keffel. He lives In the little villa on that hill opposite, and my 
mother is wonderfully fond of him. Come, Gilbert, it is about din- 
ner-time; shall we be strolling home?’^ 

So the cousins had idled away that first afternoon, and they got 
hack to the terrace below the drawing-room windows too late to find 
the marquise there. She had gone in, after the walk which she took 
daily, accompanied by Lu, Fanfan, and a large Pyrenean mastiff, 
up and down between the garden and the house, on the terrace 
flanked by stiff borders, and by tall plaster vases filled with ger- 
aniums and with many other rich-colored, sweet-scented flowers. - 

From here the view stretched eastward ; it was the opposite side 
of the house from the stable-yard, and the Pic de Bigorre turned its 
western shoulder upon them now, with low hills and wooded val- 
leys lying between. The thick foliage of the oak and beech trees 
made many a shady corner in the bank that sloped below the garden; 
a winding, serpent pathway lost itself in their shadow, and disap- 
peared into the hollow beneath; and, following the direction of this 
hidden tract, the eye reached the pointed roof of a picturesque little 
house (very different in character from any other on the coteaux) 
that lay embowered in a woody verdure about half a mile away. 

“Ah!” exclaimed Morton, observing the direction of Gilbert’s 
gaze, “ that is the chalet— a pretty little place— a fancy of my fath- 
er’s; and an expensive toy it was, too, till Madame Zophee arrived 
among us, took it, and made it her home. Y’'ou must see it one of 
these days, and Madame Zophee, too.” 

“ Madame who?” said Gilbert, to whom everybody’s name, as it 
came fresh upon him, was a matter of difficulty and amazement. 

“ Madame Zophia Petrovna Variazinka— that is her little designa- 
tion,” said Morton, laughing. “ But she is kind enough to be sat- 
isfied with Madame Zophee alone from our heretic lips, unworthy 
and unable as they are to compete with the euphonious and difficult 
uomenclature of Holy Russia. A very nice person she is, the little 
madame. You must see her some day soon. Sue has lived there 
2 




THE SUX-MAID. 


34 

for years, and we are all devoted to her— 1 as tenderly as Jeanne will 
allow me; my father and mother with an adoration that is character- 
istic of them and of her. Do you like our croquet-ground, Gilbert? 
You can see it capitally from here. Look! it is that flat on the top 
of the rising bank there, be3'’ond the rose-walk. These large trees 
make a delicious shadow of an afternoon, and the view is beautiful. 
My mother spends many an hour upon these garden-chairs, and in 
the summer-time it is our evening drawing-room. We have tea or- 
coffee there while my father plays his favorite game; you cannot 
think how fond he is of croquet. Come, let us go in now ; it is get- 
ting very late.'’ 


CHAPTER IV. 

BY A LOG FIEE. 

Chateau de St. Hilaire was not a very large house. It was 
picturesque and old-fashioned and castellated, presenting an appear- 
ance of much dignity as it towered in its lofty position on the crest 
of the sloping hill, but its rooms were not numerous, neither were 
their proportions great. The hall was handsome, and so was the 
dining-room, while the violet boudoir of the marquise was as ex- 
quisite and as luxurious as her bower in the house in town. The 
smoking-room, too, was excellent; and the large drawing-room, 
where the marquise sat, presented a delicious combination of artistic 
elegance and domestic comfort as the three gentlemen joined her 
there that evening in the after-dinner hour. 

It was a lofty room, with beautiful old fresco walls and ceiling,, 
of which the rich mouldings were picked out in delicate coloring by 
an Italian artist, in the days of an extravagant Marquis de St. 
Hilaire, several generations ago. Some courtly old family portraits 
of lovely daughters and brave sons of the house adorned the panels, 
tlie coloring of their dresses and uniforms, the bloom of their bright 
faces, and the hue of their softly powdered hair, harmonizing well 
with the walls and fresco frames, which had all, indeed, been toned, 
to suit them. There was a quantity of antique furniture in the 
room, fauteuils and sofas of Louis Xlll., artistic and uninviting; 
but these were pushed back, and ranged to advantage with the 
Sevres paneled cabinets and the tables of old marquetry, round the 
outskirts of the room; while the window where the madame sat in 
the day-time, and the wide flre-place where she was now cozily en- 
sconced, were surrounded by many little couches and chairs, low, 
well stuffed and luxurious, according to those modern fashions 
which have substituted cretonne and comfort for damask and gilt. 

And there behind a transparent glass screen sat the marquise, 
near an enormous bright-burning log fire. The chimney was open 
and graleless, in the old French manner to which she clung, loving 
it ever as familiar and picturesque, and repudiating the rapid inroad 
which took place around them of modern grates and coal. The 
room was softly lighted by small lamps shaded with rose-color, the 
tone the marquise preferred always, the one she considered became 
her best. Her evening toilet was very pretty ; her hair seemed in 
this light more snowy than ever, her face younger, and her eyes^ 


THE SUK-MAID. 


35 

more sparkling and bright. She looked busy and happy as they en- 
tered, her fingers working nimbly among her heap of gay-colored 
wools, her glance wandering continually to Fanfan and Lulu, who 
both slumbered peaceably on the rug now, in the full glow and heat 
of a crackling hre. A warm atmosphere diffused itself around her 
as she sat in view of the cheerful blaze, sheltered by her glass screen; 
and the air of the room was pleasantly pervaded by the faint, sweet 
scent of violets and roses, which always seemed to float round the 
marquise, and to penetrate everything that belonged to her with a 
delicate perfume that ever reminded one of— herself. 

She looked up brightly as the three entered. The post-bag had 
come in since dinner-tipae, and the marquise and Morton turned to 
the round table where it lay, and proceeded to examirie and peruse 
its contents. Morton found letters and newspapers, and was soon 
absorbed in them ; but the old gentleman found little to induce the 
delay of his evening sleep. He sunk into a huge chair just opposite 
to madame, and, after nodding to her gently two or three times, and 
smiling amiably in recognition of her affectionate glance, he soon 
dropped quietly away, witn his fat hands folded across his person, 
into the most profound repose. 

The marquise beckoned Gilbert to the sofa beside her. He smiled 
with a sense of pleasure and of animation as he sat down, and 
looked from her to her embroidery-frame, and to the pile of soft 
wools which he had to push away to make room for himself. He 
thought of his mother again, as she also worked continually on the 
fireside sofa at home, and he thought of her works, which were 
always coarse shawls and muffetees for the poor of Erie’s Lynn, and 
of her colors, all hard and gray. Then he watched his aunt, curi- 
ously. Her wools were all soft, many-hued, and brilliant, and her 
work was a shepherdess on a velvet background, tending most re- 
markable sheep, and listening to a singing swain. When she tired 
of this, or on saints’ days, the marquise stitched at a broidered vest- 
ment for the parish priest— a wonderful piece of work of woven gold 
and silver and filoselle, that was alike a credit to her piety and her 
skill. To-night it was the frame and the shepherdess, and as Gil- 
bert approached her, she bent over it, and said to him in a soft tone: 

“ Sit by me, dear boy; 1 like to have you. I like to see you and 
hear you talk. You remind me of old, old times, Gilbert; you do 
so resemble my own family and the brothers of m}’^ early daj^s. 
There was your uncle, my youngest brother; you are exactly like 
him. Poor Frank! he was years my junior and Anna’s. He was 
kind when 1 married, and promised to come and see me here. But 
he never did ; he w^nt to India, you know, with his regiment, and 
fell in battle. A brave fellow, a real Deningham, a dear boy! You 
are wonderfully like him. These are old days 1 am speaking of, 
Gilbert, before you were born. Soon after that event my eldest 
brother died, and the title went away to cousins. Poor Frank! it 
would all have been his if he had lived. Does your mother ever 
talk of these old times, dear child?” 

“No, aunt,” he answered, hesitatingly, “1 do not think she 
does.” 

“ What does she talk of, then — generally, I mean? Of you, I 


THE SUX>MArD. 


cJb"" 

fancy, and your future and your marriage, and the brilliant figure 
you are to make as the county M.P. — eh, Gilbert?” 

“ Ko, that is not the sort of thing either,” he replied. “My 
mother is a very quiet person, Aunt Violet; she never does talk 
much. She is very good, but, then, it is in a way of her own. She 
is very— what they call serious, you know.” 

” I know,” said the marquise. “ And 1 — 1 am a gabbling, silly 
old thing, and that is just what she would think me, and that 
is just what she thought me when 1 was a girl: then 1 was 
a silly young thing, and that was all the difference. Well, 
Gilbert, I may be. 1 do not set up for anything belter than 
my neighbors. But, God helping me, I have been as good a wife to 
my Leon there as she could have been to old Sir Stanton; and. 
Heaven knows, 1 have loved my children as well as Anna can have ' 
loved you, her only precious one, though I dare say we have had a 
different way of showing it, and of altogether acting out our lives.” 

“ 1 dare say you have,” said Gilbert, dreamily, for he was think- 
ing, as she spoke, of that strange young life of his in the past — of 
its solitude, and of its narrow scope for all affections and powem. 

” 1 have thought and thought for my children unceasingly,” the 
marquise continued, ‘ ‘ and studied their dispositions and calculated 
the probability of their lives. Has Anna done the same for you, 
Gilbert?” 

” In her own way, no doubt she has,” he answered. 

” Then, has she molded her own prejudices and opinions accord- 
ing to the character she saw you possessed? 1 wonder if she has, 
now? 1 wonder much, because there is something unusual about 
you, cherie, something of inexjjerience and want of free development, 
that is uncommon in a young Englishman of twenty-five: and I 
marvel to myself if Anna has considered you individually and char- 
acteristically in your up-bringing, or only her own prejudices and 
herself. What does she think about your marriage, Gilbert?” 

” I do not suppose,” he answered, laughing a little at this astute 
analysis of his education and of himself—” I do not suppose she is 
tiiinking about it at all, aunt.” 

” She must be. 1 am certain it is never out of her mind.” 

“Well,” he assented doubtfully, “she may be contemplating 
with aversion a great many people whom, according to her, I am 
mt to marry ; but 1 do not imagine 1 have ever seen anybody w^hom 
it is possible that she can think 1 am.” 

” Well, well, it is time you were range, Gilbert, and I can quite 
imagine to myself that that is just the very subject on which Anna 
w'ould be diliicult and unmanageable. Dieu! do not 1 remember 
when 1 married that good Leon? And I dare say she is not much 
improved in breadth of mind and in toleration since then.” 

” 1 must say she has her prejudices,” said Gilbert. 

” Well, listen; look here,” continued his aunt, rapidly; “/had 
my prejudices— 1 had my beau ideal. 1 wanted Morton to be an 
Englishman in his marriage, and to bring me an English daughter, 
here to the Pyrenees; and, above ail, 1 wished Ada to go home, and 
be as 1 was in my young days, in one of those beau tifuniomes in the 
old country which I have never ceased to love. But 1 soon realized 
that Morton was Bearnais in eveiything but his name, and his tailor, 


THE SUH-MAID. 




and Ada a petite Fran^aise to the points of her toes; so 1 gave it up 
at once, Gilbert, 1 did! And Ada married Rene de la Garonne; and 
now Morton will be settled, in a few months, with little Jeanne de 
Veuil. You must see Jeanne, Gilbert; and Ada will come here be- 
fore Christmas, I hope, to see all of us, and particularly you.” 

‘‘Jeanne is coming to-morrow night,” said Morton, suddenly 
looking up from where, sunk in the depth of a huge chair, he was 
perusing Le Gaulois by the light of a distant lamp; the name in the 
last sentence had caught his ear. 

” Yes, she is coming. By the bye, we have never told Gilbert there 
was gayety in store for him to-morrow.” 

” I told him of the dinner party when we were out to-day,” said 
Morion, ” and he made a grimace over it, 1 can tell you, too.” 

” Ah, the dinnerparty!” cried the marquis, waking up with a 
jump and joining in the conversation. “ To what proportion has it 
grown, Violette? 1 know your ways! How many people are you 
going to put into the dining-room to-morrow?” 

” Oh, you be tranquil, Leon! No one at whom you will growl — 
a pleasant pot-pourri of Pau and the neighborhood, and of national 
varieties that 1 think will do Gilbert’s education good to meet. Let 
me see — there are Comte and Comtesse de Beaulieu; there are little 
Jeanne and her sister, and Monsieur and Madame de Veuil; there are 
Baron Keffel and Bebe Beresford ; and there are the big English 
cuirassier, Hanleigh, and Mrs. and Miss Carlisle; and — last but not 
least— Madame Zophee has promised faithfully that if the evening 
is at all fine she will come ; then we are three gentlemen and one 
lady in the house— and that makes us sixteen. IVhy, that is noth- 
ing, Leon! What will you have?” 

“Ah, Madame Zophee! Then you will see her; that is famous, 
Gilbert!” said Morton. “The little ‘ Solava,’ the nightingale, as 
Baron Keffel calls her in one of his six words of Russian. I am 
glad, indeed. It is not often she can be got out of her nest.” 

” No, but she has promised she will really come to-morrow, and 1 
think she will keep her word. ” 

“ And Bebe — that is capital; and the big dragoon, the cuirassier, 
as you call him; 1 did not know you had asked them,’’ said Morton. 

” My dear, we must have ha,d pendants for the Carlisles, and they 
have sat on my conscience for the last month like — ” 

” Crows on a hand-rail,” suggested Morton, for which' speech he 
was instantly snubbed by his father. 

” Why do you laugh, Morton? Excellent persons! Fi done!” 

“Fidonc! indeed, you naughty boy!” cried his mother, laugh- 
ing, as she held up a finger at him. ” You shall have Miss Carlisle 
to take in to dinner for your impertinence, and Gilbert shall have 
Jeanne—” 


” No, no,” cried Morton. “ 1 could not stand that. Gilbert, in- 
deed ! i should be furious with jealousy the whole time, and should 
most probably throw a plate at his head. No, no! Jeanne for me, if 
you please; all the privileges of my position, or what is the fun of 
being engaged?” 

” And whom, then, is your cousin to conduct? said the marquis, 
with austerity, for he thought Morton’s tongue was running away 


38 


THE SUH-MAID. 


with him in a manner far too flippant for so serious a subject as one 
of his mother’s dinner parties. 

“ Oh, he shall have his choice of all of them, barring Jeanne,” said 
Morton. “ He may have Miss Carlisle and her flfty thousand 
pounds, if he likes, or he may conduct my future mother-in-law.” 

” Nonsense, nonsense!” cried the marquise. “ Gilbert shall take 
no one in but my own little pet, Zophee, to whom I have boasted of 
my handsome nephew, this live-long afternoon; as she is almost the 
only one of the party who can speak English fit to be understood, 
she is the best one for him to have, if only on that account.” 

” Well, well, so let it be, madre mia; and 1 do not think Gilbert 
will fare badly. 1 cannot say I pity him. If 1 were not Alexander, 
I’d certainly be Diogenes. 1 mean, if I were not to have my own 
little Jeanne, I’d have Madame Zophee before any one.” 

” Temporarily and pel manently,” said the marquise, emphatically. 
” But fancy comparing my mignon Zophee to Diogenes!” 

” Or Jeannette to Alexander!” answered Morton, laughing, as he 
rose to light his mother’s candle, while she, calling her dogs and 
gathering up her wool-work, prepared to leave the room. 


CHAPTER V. 

INCOGNITA. 

Next day a drive with his uncle in the stanhope across the coteau 
toward Gans and Louvie occupied for Gilbert the hours after lunch. 
Then he gave the mai-quise his arm, as she requested, in her prom- 
enade up anu down the terrace, while the sun set over the mountains 
behind St. Hilaire, casting a ruddy light across the hills that lay 
around them, and on the blue smoke curling from Madame Zophee’s 
house. 

Before dinner he disappeared to his own room, where Baptiste had 
established himself as his special valet, and where all the prepara- 
tions for a most elaborate toilet were already made. Gilbert got rid 
of Baptiste for the time being, assuring him that he took not twenty 
minutes to dress, and that it wanted still an hour of dinner-time; 
and then, extinguishing half the candles with w-hich that anxious 
attendant had illuminated the room, he threw himself into the huge 
chair by the fireplace, intending to rouse up his energies in a few 
minutes, and to write to his mother before beginning lo dress. 
Meantime he would revolve what he should say to her, and thoughts 
chased each other through his mind. 

He laughed to himself as he realized how difficult, and, indeed, 
how undesiralfle it would be to bestow upon her in the least a de- 
tailed or veracious description of the inmates or surroundings of St. 
Hilaire. Nothing could make her understand them, and everything 
would seem to her “ outlandish,” for so he knew she would express 
it. Everything here was contrary to the spirit of her reflections in 
every way. He knew she would call the marquis “ a frivolous old 
man,” and Morton, ” empty-headed and -mregenerate. ” Above all, 
how could he confess to her that he was much more than halt in 
love with his aunt, that reprobate daughter of the Red Lady, or how 


THE SUH-MAID. 


39 


describe her in the charming and delightful light in which she ap- 
peared to him ? 

He grew drowsy as these diflBculties arose, and he kept on planning 
the sentences within his brain by which he w’ould impart to her 
simply that the country was, after all, beautiful, that life at St. Hi- 
laire pleased him; that his relations were kind, and that he should 
not wonder if he lingered a little, and whiled away a few desultory 
weeks here before he went further on his travels or returned again 
home. So he mused very drowsily indeed, and the occupation must 
have been an agreeable, if a passive one, for the time slipped some- 
how imperceptibly away, and suddenly Baptiste broke in upon him 
with a hasty knock, an immediate entrance, and the intimation that 
it was ten minutes to the dinner-hour. 

Gilbert managed to achieve his toilet in very little over that time, 
entirely to his own satisfaction, if not to Baptiste’s; and he even 
found a moment, as he was running down-stairs, to put into his but- 
ton-hole an exquisite little bouquet of jasmine and stephanotis he 
had found ready — a pretty attention of the marquise, as Baptiste in- 
formed him, who iiad laid it on his dressing-table herself. 

He entered tbj^ drawing-room, to find it full of people, and all per- 
fect strangers to him. It was a moment calculated to induce a state 
of hopeless js^yness on his part, if it tiad been the least m his dispo- 
sition to become shy. Happily, it was not so; in fact, quite fhe re- 
verse. He had known few people in his life, but these he had 
known/ so well that a sort of unthinking confidence in himself and 
in eveS*v one about him — a ready frankness in intercourse wuth ac- 
quaintances new and old — had become habitual as second natuie to 
him,, an effect upon a character like his, not of great knowledge of 
the World, but of little. He smiled into every countenance he met as 
■upom the face of a friend; and he held out his hand with a leady 
and instinctive cordiality that aroused always from the other side 
ari immediate and similar response. Thus he was apt to say that he 
liked evervbody,” and he was ever ready to increase his acquaint- 
ance with an unsuspicious alacrity that made to him acquaintance, 
4nd even friendship, a thing of rapid growth 

( So he came into the room now, and met his aunt s scoldiiy and 
.salutation with a laughing apology for his 

divered without any apparent consciousness that every^ e> e in fh® 
room was turned curiously upon him; for, of course, every friend of 
the marquise was curious as to the looks and manner and entire - 
sonnel of this newly arrived nephew of hers. 

'‘I am not so very late, am 1? he said. 1 hope 1 am not the 

quite, but nearly, you lazy boy! 1 have been wanting you 
this last ten minutes. See! 1 must present you to all my dear 
friends and there is not a moment now ; only Madame Zophee to 
come, and then dinner. You unkind boy! who shall 1 take you to 

as she wheeled round the room, resting 
her hand on his, and glancing over the circle of her assembled 

Madame^la^ComfSse de Beaulieu, allow nm the honor of pre- 
senting to you my nephew. Sir Gilbert Erie.” This was to a stiff, 


THE SUK-MATD. 


4b 

little 61^ lady, well-dressed and well-preserved, who sat yer^^ bolt 
upright on the corner of her chair. It was a moment of high cere- 
taiohy. She accepted the presentation of Gilbert with much gra- 
ciousness, and he answered her smile and recognition with his low- 
est bow, while the marquise passed on. 

“ Madame de Veuil, in anticipation of the happy event that is to 
connect our families, allow me the honor of presenting my nephew 
to you.” 

Madame de Yeuil had been a very handsome woman, in part 
Spanish; she was brilliant in expression, olive in coloring, very ex- 
pansive in form. She received Gilbert with great suavity, but he 
scarcely glanced at her as life'^erformed his bow, so interested was* 
he in looking behind her to where^safe as to propriety, in Ihe near 
vicinity of the maternal wing, Jeannhsand Morton were engaged in a 
blissful bickering over some very amiably disputed point. 

Jeanne was as small as her mother was portly, mignon as she was 
majestic, a little bright-cheeked, merry-eyed, laughing thing, French 
in her pretty movements, and piquante ways, Spanish in her olive 
tints and in the soft expression that alternated with f un and laughter 
in her big, almond-shaped eyes. 

Morton had a drooping flower in his hand, which he was begging 
permission to put into her hair; and she was resisting him with ex- 
cessive zeal and energetic assurances, pointing out to the stupid and 
most masculine observation that it did not in the least suit the color 
of her gown. 

The introduction of Gilbert was a happy diversion, and tXeanne 
turned round to flash a shy glance upon him, and to hold otit her 
hand at Morton’s bidding; ” for this,” he said, was “ the English 
■way to say welcome and he made her repeat the word after him, 
adding to it the term “ my cousin,” which called up a bright bt^sh 
to Jeanne’s cheeks, and excited an indignant, “ Be quiet, will yop? 
j-ou naughty one!” sotto voce in French from her lips. \ 

Gilbert thought her charming, and inwardly applauded Morton’s 
taste. He would have gladly lingered there with them, and have 
tried to draw more of Jeanne’s prttty broken English words from 
her pouting lips, but the marquise drew him on. 

There were Madame and Miss Carlisle to whom he must be pre) 
seated, an English heiress and her mother, the first installment oil 
the winter arrivals to come. Then there were all the gentlemen, and 
she went quite round the circle, exhibiting her nephew with loving 
pride. 

The Comte de Beaulieu was a fine old aristocrat of a past regime, 
with thin figure and courtly manner and gi’ay head, with an order at 
his button-hole, and a stock of amazing stiffness and height inclos- 
ing his neck. He bowed grandly to Sir Gilbert, and addressed hint 
some appropriate phrase, but he spoke no word of any language save 
his own, so Gilbert, who was prudent still in his exercise of the 
French tongue, was glad to get away from him as fast as he could. 

Monsieur de Veuil was of another tjqie: a stoutish man, with large 
features and face, with a great quantity of black hair in a bushy 
condition upon his head, and with a mouth that (like his eyes) had a 
way of standing continually wide open, as if he were transfixed with 
a chronic astonishment. In fact, it was exceeifingly fortunate that 


THE SUH-MAID. 


41 


Jeanne did not at all take after liim, for lie was exactly like an 
astounded turkey-cock, and you were always expecting liim to 
gobble. 

The big, broad-shouldered English dragoon, who had come among 
them the winter before with an introduction to Morton from an old 
school-friend, was the only remaining guest, except two men who 
stood together upon the hearth-rug. The dragoon received Gilbert 
with little grace or felicity of manner, for he was utterly put out and 
knocked off his balance by the ceremony with which the marquise 
pronounced their two names. “ Aw we doo?” was all he managed 
to say, with an awkward shuffle from one foot on to the other and a 
sort of nod, as — much to his satisfaction, and still holding Gilbert’s 
hand imprisoned — she passed on. 

The two on the hearth-rug turned and bowed as madame ap- 
proached them. One of these was old and gray-haired, the other 
was young. The latter Madame de St. Hilaire passed with a smile 
and a playful tap of her fan. 

“ Go away, Bebe,” she said, “ 1 am not going to perform a cere- 
mony of introduction for two boys like you ; but liere, Gilbert, this 
is Monsieur le Baron Keffel; and my dear friend,” she continued, 
laying her hand gently on the older man’s arm, “ will you allow me 
the pleasure of making my nephew acquainted with you?” 

“ Ah!” responded the baron, in a quick, sharp tone, like the shut- 
ting up of a snuff-box. “Ah! I, am, glad; 1, am, de light, ed, sir; 
how, do, you, do?” 

He held out his hand to Gilbert, who, taking it, found his own 
closed up into a tight, eager clasp, while the old gentleman peered 
with sharp, hawk-like eyes and with amazing inquisitiveness into his 
countenance. 

“ How, do, you, do?” 

This was just the way he spoke, in clearly defined and single 
syllables, jerked out in English as perfectly correct and grammatical 
as was Gilbert’s French. Probablj", in successful imitation of either 
speech as spoken by the natives they were about equal. 

The baron was an extremely odd-looking old gentleman, and there, 
w^as certainly something very interesting about him. His figure was 
slight and short, his gray hair w^’as brushed back from a very broad 
and knotty forehead. His mouth was a restless one, and the thin 
lips worked curiously when he was silent, with a quizzical express 
ion of intense irony playing over them continually. But this w-as 
not their only expression; they could part sometimes with a sweet 
and very brilliant smile. He had sharp little eyes, and the most in- 
quisitive-looking nose imaginable. It was rather long, it tapered a 
little, and the point seemed to stick out before him with an unmis- 
takable expression of continual inquiry and insatiable curiosity. It 
looked full of interrogation now as his gaze was raised to Gilbert’s 
face, but he had no instant opportunity for investigations of any 
kind, as the young fellow whom the marquise had addressed just be- 
fore was answering her sally with the most perfect composure, and 
was insinuating his person to the front. As soon as the presentation, 
to the baron was over, he exclaimed, in a laughing voice: 

“ Well, madame, if you will not do it, I must just introduce my- 
self.” 


42 


THE SUX-MAID. 


“ You tiresome Bebe, there is no suppressing you! Here, Gilbert, 
let me present you to Mr. Henry— How do you say it, Bebe? Tell 
me; I forget half your name.” 

“ Henry Edward Fitzgerald Beresford, late of Her IMajesfy’s Cold- 
stream Guards, and very much at your service That is the way to 
do it, madame. See, I have saved you the trouble.” 

The marquise answered, as she laughed at him ; 

“ ‘ Bebe!’ ‘ Bebe!’ that is the only name by which we know him, 
Gilbert, and the only one he deserves.” 

Bebe Beresford — so called from his earliest days at the Wellington 
BaiTacks, and called so still, now he went there no longer — shook 
hands with Gilbert, who looked up at him, amused at his sang-froid 
and impertinence, and recognized the origin of the name in the 
youngest and smoothest face ever seen on such tall shoulders, in the 
fair hair weaving back from the boy’s forehead, and in the pretended 
expression of astonished innocence that played over his laughing 
mouth and his clear blue ej-es. He was fair to delicacy, and the 
hectic color and,transparent temple bespoke indeed the reason of his 
having left the Coldstreams and the beloved barracks, and of his be- 
coming an liabitue of Pau. He was a merry fellow, fond of his 
foreign home now, both people and place, and he was a universal 
favorite and a privileged character among them all. 

The marquise attacked him again presently, but he parried skill- 
fully her rallying words. The baron joined in with a dash of 
pungent satire, and Gilbert for a few minutes listened, amused. 
Then his attention wandered; he began to glance round the room; 
and so it was that he observed first what the marquise in her eager 
altercation did not notice immediately, that the door opened again, 
that a lady was announced, who, unheard in the hubbub of voices, 
quietly entered the room. The marquis had his back toward her, 
bending over Madame de Veuil; the marquise was ejaculating with 
-vehemence to the baron; so the lady stood still a moment, un- 
received and unnoticed, looking inquiringly from side to side, wdiile 
Gilbert’s eyes had time to rest upon her, and to realize her, for just 
that moment before his aunt had turned. 

She stood quite still, hesitating, in that shady light, which Madame 
la IMarquise thought as becoming to herself as to her friends. Dark 
eyes, soft and deeply shadowed, wandered slowly and steadily across 
the room, an inquiring and just slightly astonished^expression creep- 
ing into them as she paused still unobserved. Her features were 
short and irregular, resisting all classification under any describable 
type. They were harmonious, however, and artistic in their regu- 
larity, and the mouth was in itself beautiful. Indeed, some people 
were fond of saying that it was the only perfect feature that she pos- 
seted ; but in that they were wrong, for the low, broad forehead, 
with its line of straight and clear-drawn brows, was perfect also in 
refined and expressive intellectuality; and the white teeth, shining 
between the full, parted lips, were small and pearly, and exquisite 
in their perfection as well. The figure, rather tall than short, was 
full and undulating, essentially'graceful when she stood now in per- 
fect stillness as when she moved. Like many who sought a home 
in these Southern climes of Bearn, she looked fragile but not pain- 
fully delicate. Just enoug.!! so to have furnished, perhaps, sufficient 


THE SUH-MAID. 


43 


excuse for the style of her dress, which, though becoming, was un- 
like all those around her. The long skirt sweeping the ground was 
of a rich, dark shade of chestnut brown, and round her shoulders 
and close up to her throat she had thrown, in soft festoons, a scarf 
of some delicate and pliable material and of a pale primrose hue. 
It was carefully chosen, and harmonized as perfectly with the shade 
of her dress and the tone of her own coloring as the gold of the 
Autumn with their sober tints of brown. In her ears, round her 
throat, and twined through the thick coils of her shadow}'^ hair, she 
wore ornaments of the precious primrose-tinted amber of Russia, 
that matched exactly with her scarf. Of her coloring and complex- 
ion it need only be said that they were of that rare tone with wdiich 
amber can be worn successfully — ihehlanc-mat of Madame de Main- 
tenon— pale, delicate, and clear, without being sickly, opaque rather 
than transparent, and with a faint flush of color that came and went 
quickly, speaking a fervency of life and an energy of intellect and 
feeling quivering below the shield of composure and strong self- 
control. 

It was but for a moment that Gilbert could thus, contemplate her, 
and then he touched his aunt’s arm ; she paused in her rapid flow of 
words, glanced at him, followed the direction of his eyes, perceived 
her visitor, and rustled instantly across the room with eagerness and 
speed. 

“Zophee! my dear little one! A thousand pardons! 1 did not 
hear you come in.” 

“ I have but just come,” she answered, smiling in assurance to 
the marquise, who was sadly troubled at her inattention, and became 
profuse and affectionate in her apologies. 

“ 1 am so enchanted to see you,” she went on; “it was so good 
of you to come, you darling. And you are cold, too!” taking both 
the small white hands in her own and chaflng them gently. ‘ ‘ Come 
to the fire, dear; come to the fire.” 

Then she wound her arm round Madame Zophee and kissed her 
on each cheek; and while that composed person laughed softly at 
the effusiveness of the marquise’s salutation, she was drawn irre- 
sistibly on to the hearth-rug b}" one arm still round her shoulder, her 
hands being held clasped in those of her kind old friend. She re- 
sponded in gentle, caressing tones to the tenderness of the old mar- 
quise, without any unwonted excitement of demonstration certainly, 
but in a deferential, pretty way, as if submitting to it willingly, and 
full of grateful and affectionate response. 

There was a little buzz then among her gentlemen friends, and all 
eager to welcome her. The marquis had rushed forward with alac- 
rity equal to his lady’s as soon as he obseived her, and waited only 
till the energy of the marquise had a little expended itself to make 
his salutations as well. 

“ Madame,” he said, with profound obeisance, “ 1 fail in words 
to express my pleasure in the reception of you and my senses of the 
favor you accord me in thus at length honoring my humble table 
witn your fair presence. ” 

It was a very fine speech indeed when heard in all its native dig- 
nity, in its proper tongue; and when the marquis had concluded it 
with deliberate emphasis and entirely to his own satisfaction, he took 


44 


THE SUH MAID. 


the hand which Madame Zophee had managed to extricate from his 
wife, and lie pressed it with respectful tenderness to his lips. 

Morton came forward also, and when he reached the vicinity of 
Madame Zophee he drew back a step, clicked his heels together, and 
made her a low bow. With the etiquette of his nation in ceremony, 
he did not advance to take her hand until she held it out to hini. It 
was the left one this time, in token of friendliness and familiarity. 
But though he raised it and bent his head over it, he had no time to 
kiss the hand, as his father had done, before she drew it lightly 
awa)^ 

“ 1 hope,” she said, with a kind, bright glance of her eyes up to 
his, ‘‘ that you appreciate the honor I pay you. Monsieur Morton, in 
choosing this evening for my first dissipation for many a year.” 

”1 do indeed, madame,” he answered, with another profound 
bow. 

“ 1 do not think 1 could love little Jeanne better than I have loved 
her always,” she continued, looking round for the girl; “ but 1 felt 
1 must come this evening to congratulate you, vicomte, and to em- 
brace her as your fiancee. ’ ’ 

Morton turned and drew Jeanne toward her, all blushing and 
sparkling at once with new-born shyness and bliss. 

” Cherie!” whispered Madame Zophee, as she kissed the girl, and 
then held her back a little to look tenderly into her face. “ Do }"OU 
know, Yicomte Morton, 1 did not think a week ago that these eyes 
and cheeks could possibly look brighter than they did then ; but to- 
night, 1 see, after all, they can. God give j^ou sunny days, you 
happy little one!” Then she murmured : ” God bless you!” in the 
Russian tongue this time, and in a soft, low voice. 

” Go on, go on!” broke in Baron Keftel. ” Please go on in that 
tongue of music of yours. It is long since 1 have heard you speak 
it, and its accents do drop, as 1 have told you, madame, like pearls 
over velvet in my earsf” 

“ And you quote it in your smile,” she said, smiling her recogni- 
tion to him, while he bowed low, delighted at having succeeded in 
making her turn his away. ” ‘ They flow like pearls over velvet,' 
was what Bestuzhev said of Pushkin’s verse.” 

“ And 1 say it again of you when you speak in your ^olian 
voice your own poetic tongue,” answered the baron. “ Solava 
moja!” (my nightingale) he added, with one of his rare bright 
smiles. “ So may I call you, eh? mth my privilege as your adopted 
grandfather? and because— ha-ha! except you and me together, not 
one body can understand. ’ ’ 

” 1 think,” she answered, “ when you were in Russia, baron, you 
only learned such words as were pretty and useful iox flattering your 
friends.” 

^ “ Ha, ha!” laughed the marquis, with a heavy shake of his portly 
sides, for the conversation continued in French at the moment, and 
so the repartee was within his reach. 

” Well hit,” said the marquise. “ But please, chere Zophee, do 
not cure him of making you pretty speeches; for, if so, he will be a 
savage bear entirely, seeing he makes them to no one else.” 

“ Ah, Madame la Marquise!” cried the baron, in horrified expos- 


THE SUN-MAID. 45 

tulation, and turning to enumerate on his fingers all the graceful 
things he had that very evening said already to her. 

Gilbert had been watching the group with unconscious admiration 
all this time, feeling rather than thinking how picturesque they all 
looked in that pretty, old-fashioned, soft-shaded room; and he had 
been congratulating himself the while inwardly that he, and not the 
baron, was to take Madame Zophee to dinner. 

Suddenly at this point he felt [his gaze transfixed and fascinated 
by the expression of old Keflel’s face, and he burst into a fit of 
merry laughter as he waited for what was to come next. It was irre- 
sistible; the baron looked so horrified at the accusation of the mar- 
quise, and yet so delighted to enter into battle again, eager as ever 
over this new cause for parry and attack, that Gilbert’s sense of the 
ridiculous was touched irrepressibly, and he laughed outright; with 
such a merry peal too, striking so fresh and youtliful on the ear, 
that it drew Madame Zophee ’s eyes instantly upon him. At that 
moment dinner was announced. 

The baron’s self-defense and expostulation were quashed for the 
time being, for the marquis was immediately in a state of bustle that 
absorbed the whole occasion and himself. He went off at last with 
the Comtesse de Beaulieu, the comte following with Madame de 
Veuil. Then the marquis exclaimed, “Mon dieu! Gilbert!” and, 
seizing his arm, performed a rapid introduction, and hurried him 
off wuth Madame Zophee without delay. 

Then it appeared that Monsieur de Veuil, who knew no English, 
must make the best of “Madame Karrleel,” who spoke little 
French. The marquise waived this difficulty without any observ^a- 
tiou whatever, and dispatched them into the dining-room, making 
strange remarks to each other by the way. The big dragoon fell to 
Jeanne’s elder sister, who, having happily a comfortable facility in 
the English language, did not give that heavy person “so bad a 
time ” as he had feared. The Bebe conducted Miss Carlisle. Then 
Morton tucked his Jeanne cozily under his arm, and sent the baron 
and his mother out before them, that they two might be the last, 
and have a little bit of joke, as they lingered, quite to themselves. 

Gravely, however, they (as all the others) had to file through the 
regiment of servants — who stood lining the hall — truly magnificent 
to-night in their full dress, looking exactly as if they had come 
down, with the gilt chairs and sofas, direct from Louis Xlll. Con- 
spicuous among them, alike from the dignity of his person and the 
plainness of his costume, was Baptiste, who walked solemnly mto 
the dining-room with the procession, and placed himself behrnd Gil- 
bert’s chair— a post he assumed and a privilege ceded to him on the 
score of his eloquence in the language of Britain, and “ Monsieur 
Bare Geelbeit’s ” acknowledged difficulty in contending with 
French. There he stood, and when Gilbert smiled, as he turned 
round and saw him, Baptiste bowed with that air of conscious merit 
and importance which never forsook him under any circumstances, 
however trying. 

Gilbert and Madame Zophee, delayed by that tardy introduction, 
had hastened after the Comte and Madame de Veuil into the dining- 
room, scarcely exchanging a word. There was no time for it. They 


4G 


THE SUN-MAID. 


barely reached the entrance as the marquis turned round in conster- 
nation at the processional pause. 

As each couple entered the dining-room, the outburst of admira- 
tion was unanimous; the table was so pretty, and the comi^liments 
implied by its appearance were precisel}'^ of the ^aceful and poetic 
nature so much in sympathy with French taste. Decorated in honor 
of Jeanne, and of the happy occasion which brought them all to- 
gether, it was a mass of snowy flowers, relieved by quantities of 
green maiden-hair tern, through which the lamp-light glistened 
softly, veiled with dexterity by the feathery shade. It was beauti- 
ful, fresh, cool, and most artistic in arrangement, as became the 
perfect taste for which the marquise was renowned. It drew forth 
congratulations from everybody; a graceful acknowledgment from 
Morton, who was highly pleased; and from Jeanne the grateful 
glance of her bright, happy eyes, as, all blushing and overcome with 
the blissful excitement of her position, she bowed with reverence to 
her future mother-in-law, and took the place of honor allotted to her 
between the father and son. 

There was much laughter, and many apologies exchanged in high- 
toned French, as the party sat down, and Gilbert found himself in 
dangerous proximity to the lace flounces of Madame la Comtesse de 
Beaulieu, fie had to bow and murmur respectful depreciation of 
himself and of his chair before he felt he could venture to appro- 
priate it; and, alas! when the comtesse was pacified, he found 
Madame Zophee had Monsieur de Veuil on her other side, and {a, 
propos Xo long trains and ladies’ dress, and Pau rooms and crowded 
receptions, at the Prefecture) that gentleman had already begun to 
“ gobble ” a great deal. 

“ Ouere possible maintenant—Bc^iTce possible now, madame,” he 
was saying; “ in this lower world for men there is really no room! 
At the Prefecture, for instance, what with trains and laces and trim- 
mings, one cannot move — one cannot speak — one cannot breathe! It 
is impossible!” 

Gilbert bent slightly over to listen. He had not the least intention 
of allowing Monsieur de Veuil to absorb his lady beyond the limits 
of the soup; but for the moment he amused him. The wide-open 
mouth, the round staring eyes, the expression of serious importance 
on nis countenance, tne eager gesticulations of his large hands, were 
all amaziDg; and Gilbert was gazing at him when Madame Zophee 
(not having at all forgotten her own squire) turned and met the 
laughing expression of his eyes. It pleased and touched her, and 
she smiled in response. Gilbert had good eyes, of a bright and true 
blue; they were fringed with dark lashes which gave them color, 
shadow, and change, and the look in them, now he was amused, 
was so merry and boyish that it was impossible not to answer with 
a sympathetic smile. 

‘‘How I wish 1 understood French better!” he said at last to 
3Iadanie Zophee, when they had exchanged one expressive glance in 
recognition of their mutual sense of amusement. 

“Do you not understand it?” she said, speaking for the first 
time in his hearing in English. ” I beg your pardon! How very 
rude 1 have been!” 

“ Not at all. 1 did gather a meaning, as it happened, Just now, 


THE SUH-MAID. 47 

enough to he appalled at the difficulties of existence as Monsieur de 
Veuil paints them.” 

” Perhaps it is not so bad,” she answered, ” for people who do 
not take up so much room. 

“Well, 1 hate crowded parties myself, 1 must say,” continued 
Gilbert; ” and at home I frequent them very little indeed.” 

” lou will have to get accustomed to them if you stay at Pau,” 
she answered. ” 1 think there, particularly, people like to live in 
crowds.” 

” But the crowds have not arrived yet, have they?” 

Oh, dear, no! only just beginning to come. You and Mrs. Car- 
lisle and that tall gentleman, whom 1 do not know, are the first in- 
stallment of the visitors for this year.” 

” But I do not count, you know,” he explained; “ at least not for 
the winter, and the balls, and that kind of thing. I fancy 1 shall be 
back in England long before m}'’ aunt goes into town.” 

” Shall 3 ’^ou? ah, indeed! 1 am sorry! 1 know the marquis hoped 
to keep you for a much longer time, and that will be quite a little 
visit.” 

“ Well, 1 do not know,” answered Gilbert; ” one can never tell— 
can one? But, you see, I am by way of making a tour, and 1 am 
only supposed to be beginning it at Pau here. There are all sorts of 
places, besides, that 1 have got to visit.” 

” Really! you are starting on your travels, are you? And how 
far do you mean them to extend?” 

” Well, do you know I— forget exactly,” he answered; ” but I 
have made a list of the places 1 had a fancy to see, and marked 
them all out on a map. I shall look over it if you like and tell you. ” 

” That sounds rather an original way of planning a tour.” 

” Do you think so? Well, 1 dare say it is; but I remember how 
it happened, and somehow to me it seems quite natural.” 

“Audit happened— how?” Madame Zophee inquired in her 
turn, looking with a little amusement and some awakening curios- 
ity into his bright face. 

“ Well,” he continued, “ it -was one evening last winter in the old 
library at home. 1 was reading something — in the Times, 1 think it 
was — that put it into my head that 1 ought to travel, and 1 went and 
ferreted out the big atlas, and wrote a list of places, and penciled 
out the way, and made up my mind about it there and then.” 

“ How very energetic!” said Madame Zophee, laughing softly at 
the rapidity of his descriptive style. 

“ Yes, it is the sort of way 1 always like to do a thing; if you are 
determined upon it, just do it right otf systematically at once. But 
then, you see, 1 could not get started directly,” he added, assuming 
a more serious air. 

“No? Were there difficulties in the way?” 

“Not difficulties exactly, but there were quantities of things I had 
to attend to at home before leaving, and 1 had to make arrange- 
ments for all to go on smoothly till 1 get back. But I feel 1 must 
not stay here long, because I have a great many other places to go 
to, and I ought to be getting home again some day very soon.” 

“ Why, you have only just left home.” 

“Yes; but, do you know, I have not quite got reconciled to the 


THE SUH-MAID. 


48 

idea that 1 hem left it, and 1 do not feel sure that I ever shall. 1 do 
not like being so far from the old place, somehow. It is the sort of 
feeling I did not in the least expect to have, but I cannot get rid of it. ” 

“ But you will enjoy being here with your cousin, surely?” 

“ Oh, yes, immensely, and 1 am beginning to think this a very 
pleasant place; but still 1 do not know— 1 long for the old home 
too. So there, Madame Zophee, I have given you the whole history 
of my projected travels, and confess to you that I do not feel like 
extending them very far. ” 

And a funny litle history she thought it. 

“ You seem very fond of your home, Sir Gilbert?” she said^ 
presently. 

He paused an instant before he answered, a sort of unconscious 
feeling coming over him as he looked quickly round at her, that he 
would give a great deal to make her repeat the sentence again, or at 
least his own name at the end of it. It struck him suddenly as a 
most euphonious one, Madame Zophee’s English was faultless in 
grammar and expression, and in accent perfectly pure, but she spoke 
the language with an intonation that was curiously musical, and 
quite peculiar to herself— so Gilbert thought; really, it was only 
peculiar to those finest of all modern linguists, the women of her 
race. Her voice was round and mellow, and in pronouncing her 
English words she lingered on the vowels, and softened the harder 
consonants, and seemed to blend the syllables together with a sort of 
harmonious rhythm that recalled every moment Baron Keff el’s simile 
of the velvet and the pearls; and when she came rather hesitatingly 
to pronounce Sir Gilbert’s name, she softened the g just a little, 
leaned slightly upon the r, and dropped the t at the end altogether, 
till it became in his ear a most singularly agreeable sound. 

He had thought to himself, when he had first contemplated ad- 
dressing her, that he should never have patience to converse with a 
"woman who talked broken English ; but as she spoke, he conceived 
suddenly a new opinion, namely, that it was the height of folly for 
any of the favored race of Anglia to learn any foreign language 
whatever, seeing that their own was certainly the must musical ever 
heard out of Eden on this earth. It had never struck him before, 
but now he was sure of it. After pausing a moment, she thought 
she had spoken indistinctly, and she repeated her question again. 

“You are fond of your home?” 

“ Oh, very,” he said, “lam fond of a country life, and of all it 
comprises, and my home is in the country, far away from any 
town.” 

“ And you live there entirely?” 

“ Yes, with a couple of months’ variety to London or Scotland 
now and then.” 

“ In the country of England, all through the year, and quite 
alone?” 

“ No, no; not alone,” he answered, “ not quite; that is to say, i 
have my mother.” 

“ Ah, she does live with you. Zo — ” 

“ And you live in the country here, Madame Zophee?” he said, 
turning the tables of inquiry to her side. “In that case we are 
unanimous.” 


THE SUi^-MAID. 49 

“ Yes, I live in the country too; but — 1 have no mother to live 
with me,” she answered, with a little tall of sadness in her voice. 

” You live alone— quite alone? you don’t say so! Fancy! Weil, 
1 do not think 1 should like that, 1 know I should miss my dear old 
mother terribly if she were away. But still 1 would live in the coun- 
try all the same, 1 think. You see, one has always the dogs and 
horses, hasn’t one?” 

” One has,” she answered, smiling a little ; “ and they are wonder- 
ful companions, certainly. And here, you know, no one coulctfeel 
dull, even in the most utter solitude, while there is the couhtry 
itself. The mountains and the flowers are society suflScient, surely 
—nobody complain. ” 

She seemed to murmur' the words absently as she spoke, as though 
more to assure herself than him. 

“ Well, no; it is glorious, but you should see our part of the 
world as well, Madame Zophee. It does not yield the palm to any, 
1 think, taking it all round, as a place to live in. It is pretty, and it 
is thorough country, and then it is home, you know; and, then, 
there is the sport. 1 am sure there is nowhere else one could have 
such runs as we have sometimes of an open winter, and there is al- 
ways something to do every month of the year. Have you never 
been to England, madame?” 

“ Never.” 

“ But some day 5 ^ou will come?” 

” I should like it immensely,” she answered. “ Some day 1 hope 
I may.” 

” I am sure you will. How I should like to show you Erie’s 
Lynn!” 

” You are very kind, and 1 should very much like to see it. It is 
a phase in life of which I have read much and fancied more, but 
which I have yet to witness — the English country home.” 

” I am sure you would like it. And do you think some day you 
will come, really?” 

“ I hope so, indeed. I do travel now and then — in the summer- 
time, you know, when it gets too hot on our coteaux here — and one 
of these da 5 "s I shall certainly make my summer journey to England. ' ’ 

” That is famous; and then you will come down and see us at 
Erie’s Lynn. There is so much I should like to show you there, as 
you are fond of the country and flowers and every thing of that kind, 
flow pleasant it would be!” 

“It would indeed be very pleasant,” she replied; “and when, 
some day, 1 do come to England, I will certainly claim the full 
privileges of your invitation.” 

“There! that is a promise,” he continued, smiling with sunny 
pleasure as he turned to her, just in expression of the half-conscious 
feeling he had of his enjoyment of her society, and of self-congratu- 
lation as he felt how well and how easily the}’’ got on. 

Madame Zophee w^as looking with a soft, bright smile at .him, 
much amused at his eagerness and at his instant impulse of hospi- 
tality. 

“Ah!” she said, presently, “England is far away. Who 
knows? I wonder, after all, if I shall ever go there.” 


50 


THE SU^"-MA.ID. 


“ Of course ^'ou will,” he answered; “and 1 am sure will enjoy 
it.” 

“ 1 shall look forward to it, at all events,” she said. 

“ And are you really foud of horses and dogs?” continued Gil- 
bert, presently. “lam so glad you are, for it is so nice, 1 think, 
when one first knows people, to find we like many of the same 
things.” 

“1 wonder if we do?” she replied, laughing softl 3 ^ “ 1 am fond 
of many, many things, Sir Gilbert. I should think you were a lover 
much more of people than things — of living, 1 mean, rather than 
inanimate surroundings.” 

“ 1 am fond of most people I know in a sort of way, certainl}'', ” 
said Gilbert; “ but as to loving, I reallj' do not think there is any- 
thing for wiiich one can care more than for a dog .you have had 
since you were a little fellow, or a horse that has carried you well 
for 3 ’^ears and years. I am sure 1 could never like a man who did 
not feel his dog was a real friend to him, ana who could not love his 
horse.” 

“ There we quite agree,’’ she said. “ 1 most sincely do both. My 
biggest dog is one of my dearest friends, and my horses are real pets. ” 

“ Are the}', indeed? 1 am so glad! Are they English — did you 
have them out?” 

“ No, we are all Russian —dogs, horses, and every one of us, ex- 
cept a Pyrenean hound, my trusty watchman, and an old Belgian 
who is ending his days in repose with me. ’ ’ 

“ A Belgian dog?” 

“ Yes; 1 bought him out of a cart once, in which he had worn 
away his strength, in the streets of Bruges. ’ ’ 

“ How delightful! and what a number of them you seem to have! 
How 1 should like to see them all!” 

“ Well, perhaps the marquise will allow one or two of them to 
come and pay you a visit; but 1 think I must send my Ivan also, or 
my Russian Lustoff , my special friend and companion, w^ould cer- 
tainly devour Fanfan or Lu.” 

“ That icoidd be a catastrophe!” 

“It would, indeed! Fancy the dear marquise’s feelings — it 
would be terrible!” 

“ Well, at all events, that is one point on which we are complete- 
ly sympathetic, Madame Zophee, and that is very pleasant. 1 won- 
der if we should find many more if we went on?” 

“ Probably a great man}%” she answered; “ but would you mind 
the effort of making a few remarks in French to your other neish- 
bor? because I hear a dreadful pause succeeding to frantic efforts at 
a mutual understanding between Mrs. Carlisle and IMonsieur de 
Veuil. They have been torturing my right ear all dinner-time, i 
think I must put in a word or two by way of assistance. ’ ’ 

Gilbert looked round to see what she meant, and caught sight of 
Monsieur de Veuil’s profile, on which sat a fixed expression of de- 
spair. Beyond was Mrs. Carlisle, also at the end of her energies, 
and, after resting an instant upon her, Gilbert’s eyes wandered round 
the table to the different couples, and then suddenly he threv/ his 
head back and laughed again with that same ring of boyish glee in 


THE SUK-MAID. 51 

bis voice which had struck Madame Zophee so much in the draw- 
ing-room. 

“ Why do you laugh?” she said, a little reproachfully, for she 
thought It hard on her right-hand neighbor and on Airs. Carlisle, 
and she felt compunction for having drawn his attention to them • 
and then she looked up at him, for he was laughing still, and could 
not answer her, and she thought again that she had never seen any- 
thmg so bright, so cloudless, and so youthful as the expression of 
his face. 

His youthful look specially surprised her, for his aunt had said 
that he was twenty-five. She herself was scarcely quite that, and 
yet, surely, she thought, she looked much the elder of the two-^and 
so she did. 

Not that the bloom of her youth or her beauty had in liny way left 
her, but there rested in her eyes and on her brow that expression of 
having lived, and of much of the knowledge of what Umtig means. 
There was a depth in her tranquility that a quick observer, sensi- 
tive to the impression of inner character, felt immediately was pro- 
found and impenetrable. 

A brightness floated above, the soft, clear radiance of a sunbeam 
shining on a calm, running stream, but the evidence was there, in 
the smile, in the glance, often even in her tones and words, of under- 
currents in the life-stream where the waters ceased to be transparent, 
and where their reflections were unseen. 

On his countenance, on the other hand, as now in his laughing 
eyes, there was no knowledge of a past, and nothing of experience. 
The stream was all glistening and clear, reflecting quite unclouded 
every fleeting sun-ray or shadow as it went or came. But the 
stream was fervent and rapid, so there was no foretelling for him 
into what stormy cataracts or surging whirlpools it yet might fall. 

“ I am laughing,” he said, at length, “ at everybody. 1 am very 
sorr}-; it is very wrong. But do look at my aunt and that old baron! 
They have never once ceased fighting since dinner began. And look 
at my uncle! The comtesse has been too much for him, and he is 
going quietly to sleep. And there is that big fellow, Hanleigh, has 
been staring at his plate for (he last half-hour, and has not been able* 
to think of a single word to say to poor Aliss de Veuil. And do 
look at that Bebe, as they call him ! H e has neglected Aliss Carlisle 
shamefully, and has been joining in, as usual, with the baron. He 
and Alorton and little Jeanne are the only ones who look thoroughly 
li3.ppy, unless it is my aunt and — Oh, what a bore! she is bowing 
to the table in general, and you are all going away. I am so sorry. 

I thought, in France, you went, ladies and gentlemen, all together 
into the drawing-room. Alay 1 not come?” 

No! he must not. His aunt scolded him as she passed him for 
the proposition, and, tapping him on the shoulder, told him to stay 
where he was. 

“ An English custom my mother clings to,” said Alorton, as the 
door closed on the last of the lady-procession, and he came back to 
the table. ” She says it freshens us all up to be left behind for a 
while, and that we are twice as agreeable in consequence when the 
blissful moment of reunion arrives. 1 used to agree "with her, but 
somehow I do not do so to-night.” 


52 


THE SUH-HATD. 


“ Is or do 1,” said Gilbert, decided! v. 

“ Do you not? That is all right, ’^Morton answered. “ Then, 
as soon as the venerated elders have settled to their claret, you and 
1 may perhaps fight > 011 . ” 

CHAPTER yi. 

CHEONIQUE SCANDALETJSE. 

“ The elders,” as IVlorton called them, took kindly, apparently, to 
this fashion of the marquise. The old Comte de Beaulieu and Mon- 
sieur de Veuil gravitated toward the lower end of the table, where the 
marquis saC and where the claret bottles, also in English fashion, 
were rangcjd in front of him; and the three were soon deep in what- 
ever to the mind of the Bearnais gentldman and landlord represents 
poor-rates, taxes, magisterial duties, or any such rural interests and 
concerns. 

Morton, with a graceful air of courteous hospitality, proceeded to 
beg the three younger men to take their seals again, and to help 
themselves, as they desired, to wine. But Captain Hanleigh, the 
big dragoon, had risen with glass well replenished, and, walking to 
the fire-place, he leaned upon the high carved mantel-shelf and began 
kicking the burning logs about in a rather unceremonious effort to 
produce a blaze. 

” On the whole, a bear!” soliloquized Gilbert, staring at his com- 
patriot; but Norton, after one glance of astonishment at this heaviest 
of all heavy dragoons, took the hint immediately, and applied him- 
self with energy to the replenishment of the fire. Gilbert paused on 
the hearth-rug beside him. Bebe Beresford wheeled round in his 
chair, sat riding backward upon it, and with his arms resting on the 
top bar and his wine-glass in his hand, proceeded to gaze up at his 
military countryman, and to survey him y/ith an air of supercilious 
and speculative curiosity, just as if he had never seen him before, 
and had 7wt spent the whole of last winter, more or less, in his 
society. 

Meanwhile Baron Keffel felt Tiis hour had come. He had had his 
eye on Gilbert as the newest phenomenon of interest in his horizon 
during a great part of dinner, and had formed many theories upon 
him in his own philosophic and very observant mind; and informa- 
tion, as much and as direct as possible, was now necessary to satisfy 
his inquiring faculties to the full extent 

Old Keffel had been a great traveler in his youth; he had been 
nearly everywhere and among all sorts of races and kinds of men. 
He had been a little in Russia, a good deal in the East, veiy often in 
Italy, and once or twice in England, and by dint of inquiry, minute 
and undaunted, everywdiere and on every conceivable subject, he 
had collected an enormous mass of versatile information. All this, 
in the seclusion of his study at his favorite retreat in the Pyrenees, 
he perseveringly reduced from copious notes and diaries into theo- 
ries, which a^ain came into recognized existence and were announced 
to the world in eccentric circles in reviews and monthly magazines, 
both in Germany and France. By such media he convej’ed to the 
reading mind of both nations many wonderful theories and details 


THE SUN-MAID. 53 

tliat would indeed have much astonished the particular people under 
notice and description for the time being. 

He had opinions on government sprung from observations stretch- 
ing from London to Afghanistan ; but specially upon domestic life 
he had many original views, gathered from personal acquaintance 
with nearly every form of social conventionalism, from the Calmuck 
or Kirghez Cossacks of Taitary to the time-honored institutions of 
the British hearth. “ Seizing opportunites ” was his strong point, 
and now in Gilbert he saw one not on any account to be lost. Gil- 
bert was indeed, in his eyes, a representative of a great^ class— the 
“ English Konotee-gentleman, ” “ Lord of the Soil,” ” Knight No- 
bleman of the British Empire;” so the baron would probably, in ’his 
next article in the “ Beview of National and Foreign Manners,” de- 
scribe him. In the meantime, a little investigation would be oppor- 
tune. So he came round the table, joined the group on the hearth- 
rug, and standing very close to Gilbert, turning up toward him his 
inquisitive little nose, and his sharp pair of hawk’s eyes, he opened 
the conversation with the leading inquiry : 

” Do, you, feesh, or, do, you, shoot?” 

“Both, when 1 have the chance,” said Gilbert, smiling in an- 
swer to the bright little eyes. 

” Ah, zo, then, 1, would, meet, you, double.'* 

“ 1 beg your pardon ? ” 

“ Yes, I, have, traveled, a, great, deal, sare. 1 have been in many 
contrees of the world, and I have never been to the top of a highest 
hill nr to the bottom of a valley, to the bed of any river, anywhere, 
not in any land, but 1 find there an Englishman who feesh or shoot” 

“Ha!” exclaimed Captain Hanleigh, with a loud, heavy laugh, 
as he sipped the marquis’ claret with a critical air. “He won’t 
have much chance of doing either here, at all events.” 

“ Yes, he may,” ciiedthe baron, sharply, turning on the dragoon, 
whom he had already on a former occasion profounded, angry at 
the interruption which threatened to disturb his investigation now. 
“ He may feesh the Gave, if he will— like, what is he— the captain 
— bah! 1 forget the name— a very high, thin man, who goes to shoot 
in the coteaux, and catch the many little feesh.” 

“ Very leetle, and not many,” responded Captain Hanleigh, 
mimicking rather pointedly the baron’s accentuation. “ 1 should 
think Erie’s ideas of fishing would fit in with Captain What-is-his- 
name about as Well as his ideas of hunting would with a run with 
the Pan hounds. ” 

“ Come, come,” cried Morton, “ we cannot let you run down the 
sports of Pau to my cousin, as 1 mean him to stay here and enjoy 
' them.” 

“By Jove, Ido not want to run them down!” said Hanleigh; 
“ why should 1? I do not care two straws about them, whether 
they are good or bad. ” ,, , , 

“But 1 do,” said Morton, rather hotly. “Ido not think it is 
fair of men to come here two winters running like you have done, 
Hanleiffh, and to have lots of fun out of the place, fun enough at 
least to bring you back again, and yet go on abusing it the whole 
time.” 

“ Not on the square,” said Bebe, decidedy. 


THE SUN-MAID. 


“ By Jove!” repeated Hanleigh, “ J do not say it is a bad sort of 
p^ace. A fellow can have a very good time here in some ways, 1 
grant ye, but to talk of sport is ridiculous. ’ ’ 

“Please, captain,” said the baron, snappishly, “did you ever 
shoot a boar in the Pyrenees?” 

“ No, never; can’t say I did— never had the chance,” said Han- 
leigh. 

“Well, 1 have,” said Morton; “and 1 do not think any man 
should go running down the sport of a place till he has tried it. 
Pheasant battues and deer drives are not the sport of the Pyrenees, 
if j^ou like, Hanleigh, and I’ll grant that our fox-hunting is but an 
offshoot from your part of the world, consequent on the place be- 
coming an English winter station ; but go up into the mountains 
and spend a month or two above us here among the Basques, and 
then, when you have shot a couple of isards and a boar or two, you 
may come back and boast that you are blase of the sports of the 
Pyrenees, if you choose; but not till then.” 

“ I should like tremendously to do that,” put in Gilbert, eagerly. 

“ Well, wait a bit,” said Morton, “ and by and by, when the time 
comes, we shall. ” 

“ Awh, of course — but — fact is, one does not come to Pau at this 
time of year for that kind of thing,” began Hanleigh. 

“No!” struck in Bebe. “You come to hire the Pyrenees for the 
season, certainly, but not for the sport they can afford.” 

“ Hire the Pyrenees?” said the baron, inquisitively, with a little 
puzzled sort of laugh. 

“Yes, of course. Half the people who come down here,” con- 
tinued Bebe, “ feel exactly as if they had -rented them with their 
apartments and their sunshine, for which they pay so many more 
francs a month. Have you never noticed one or two of the genus 
Briton promenading the Place of a fine day, and exhibiting the view 
to the last comer as if it were a meritorious achievement of their own, 
and the winter sunshine a performance that did them especial credit? 
1 have often.” 

“ He-e-h!” sniggled the baron, “ How eccentric!” 

“ True, though; and so men like our friend here — begging your 
pardon, Hanleigh — come and hire us all round (for I consider my- 
self as of Pau, you know), us and our balls, and our hunt, and our 
band-day, and our promenade, and our cricket-field, and everything, 
and patronize us, and take us down about it all the whole time. I 
call it hard lines, 1 do. It works me up tremendously.” 

Bebe was a person privileged to speak his mind. 

“ I did not say anything about the society,” said Hanleigh. “ 1 
think in some wa3’^s it’s an awfully nice place.” 

“ And containing a few rather nice people,” said Bebe, sarcastic- 
_iilly, “ who have been, on the whole, rather civil to j''ou — and me.” 

“ Uncommonly civil — overpowering civil, sometimes,” responded 
Hanleigh. “ 1 think you have to be careful, 1 do. I do not think 
a man can know everybody in a place like this, can he? It is so 
uncommonly awkward some time afterward, you know, at other 
places— at home, and that sort of thing.” , 

“Oh, no!” said Bebe, with pretended solemnity; “it does not 
trouble one a bit. You can always do like — \yho was it? — old 


THE SUN-MAID. 


55 

Brummel, I think — a capital plan. A man came up to him in St, 
James’ street once, ancl said, ‘ How do you do?’ and ‘Ah!’ was the 
old beau’s reply, in meditadve accents, ‘ don’t know you, sir; you 
have the advantage of me: 1 never saw you before.’ ‘Oh, yes!’ 
says his friend. ‘ Don’t you remember? 1 met you at Boulogne; 
you used to dine with me there.’ ‘ Indeed, I dare say,’ responds 
the cool old fellow. ‘ It is very possible; and I can only add that 1 
shall have great pleasure in knowing you when I meet you— at 
Boulogne again,’ ” 

“ Ha, ha!” laughed the baron, intensely delighted at the acquire- 
ment of a fresh anecdote, which he always found, in his annotations, 
gave the evening’s conversation a certain finish and point. 

“ What a snob!” said Gilbert. 

” Do you think so?” said Bebe, with innocent astonishment. 

“ Well, I don’t know,” continued Hanleigh, in his drawling tones 
again. ‘‘It is all very well, but, nevertheless, one can not know 
everybody in a place like this.” 

“ / know nearly everybody, ” said Bebe, “ and I am tremendously 
fond of them all. They have been wonderfully kind to me; and I 
came out here as seedy a little chap as possible, Erie, and I am as 
right as a triv6t now.” 

“ I have got to taKe my cousin round and introduce him, one of 
these days,” said Morton. ‘‘ There are numbers of people I should 
like him to know. Has anybody come back yet, Bebe?” 

“ Well, yes; nearly all the stationaries are turned up again. The 
set that have been to Biarritz have come back, and several others ; 
but very few new people have arrived yet, ” 

“ AVell, Erie will have the advantage of a first selection,” said 
Hanleigh, ‘‘ for his specialties in the circle of his winter friends.” 

‘‘ All very well, Morton; but you know I cannot allow myself to 
while away the whole winter here,” interrupted Gilbert; but Mor- 
ton had no time to answer, for Bebe began to hold forth again. 

(Alas for the baron ! the opportunity was lost to the cause of in- 
vestigation forever; the conveisation continued persistently general, 
as they still stood grouped upon the hearth-rug.) 

‘‘ Well, you see,” said Bebe, ‘‘ if Erie is going to winter here (as, 
of course, he is), he ought to be introduced, and put an fait with the 
whole thing at once, and then he is sure to enjoy himself. There 
are quantities and quantities of charming people he must know, and 
perhaps there are just one or two he might as well avoid.” 

‘‘ A few of the widows, for instance,” said Hanleigh. “ There 
are sometimes some of them uncommonly kind.” 

“Well,” began Bebe, sagely, “ but — ” 

“Yes,” the baron interrupted him, with a sardonic grimace. 
“ Ha — ah! There is certainly a masse of veedows at Pau. And 
me! I am a veedow man— and ah! yes! it is sometimes very deeffi- 
cult, very deefficult, indeed!” 

This was uttered with an air of plaintive deprecation that sent 
Gilbert and Morton .off into a fit of merry laughter again; but Bebe 
was very solemn over it, indeed. 

“ Yes,” he sighed. “ ‘ Don’t marry a vidder, Sam!’ But then, 
.alas! it is just the thing Sam is so rery apt to do.” 

“Ha-ha! he has the opportunity, at all events, here,” laughed 


56 


THE SUH-HAID. 


Captain Hanleigh; “ and if he is lucky enough to escape ‘ a vidder/ 
long before the season is done ten to one he falls into the snares of 
a mature siren,” 

” Wa-a-h!” growled Bebe. “Goon. I’ll sit perfectly still till, 
you are done.” 

“ Fi done, Bebe,” cried Morton, “And you the acknowledged 
slave of Madame Philistaire ! Oh, Bebe ! ’ ’ 

“ Confessed, confessed!” sighed Bebe. “ And ’tis the knowledge- 
of my chains that makes me groan.” 

“1 do not mind— them,” drawled Hanleigh; “I won’t abuse 
them. You know,” he continued, confidentially, “ they are so 
«ir/w%safe,” 

“Peste! I do not know what you mean, you, young men,’*” 
snapped the baron, suddenly, failing to catch exactly these new 
views of the sex acknowledged fair and tyrannical, and consequently 
much disgusted that he should not be able to make sufficiently lucid 
notes of the conversation to build any novel theory upon it when he 
went home. It dealt, in fact, with matters in an age of the world’s 
history just a little ahead of him, and quite beyond his old-fashioned- 
and very chivalrous ideas, 

“ Does that little woman we have here to-night, St, Hilaire,” con- 
tinued Hanleigh, presently, “ belong to the phalanx of the fair and 
frisky?” 

“ W ho ? ” said Morton . 

“Why, the Pole— Russian— or what is she? that little woman 
with the killing eyes and the yellow beads in her head?” 

“ Are you talking of Madame Variazinka?” exclaimed IMorton at 
last, while Gilbert, flushing up suddenly, he scarcely knew why, 
turned upon Hanleigh with a frown, 

“ What do you mean?” he said, in an angry tone, 

“ Is that her name? 1 suppose that zs who I mean,” continued 
Hanleigh, coolly. 

“ She!” exclaimed Morton. “ FTo, 1 should not think so, indeed? 
Why, she has not been at a single ball ever since I have kuovTi her, 
and nobody could be less— that kind of thing than she is.” 

“Oh, oh! of the quiet sort, is she?” said Hanleigh, sneeringly. 
“ AVell, I don’t know but ^Aans about the most dangerous kind. 
She is awfully pretty in an odd kind of way, and 1 call her double- 
barrels uncommonly dangerous— should not like to run the fire of 
them i know; 1 should be making an ‘ ath ’ of m3’^self.” 

“Kota very difficult achievement either,” growled Gilbert 
voce to Bebe, as he bent over the table to pour himself out a glass of 
wine, 

“ Who is she?” continued Hanleigh again. 

Morton colored as he paused before answering this question, and 
looked into the blazing wood fire for a moment as if considering 
what he should reply. But suddenly, before he had time to speak, 
the baron turned upon the big soldier, and exclaimed, in an authori- 
tative tone, “ Sir, I, did, not, quite, understand,* you, in, j^our, re- 
marks, at, first, but, now, 1, do, penetrate, them, and, 1, do, request, 
that, you, make, not, this, lady’s name, a subject, of your discus- 
sion. She is here, a stranger,‘and alone. The ladies of your own 


THE SUH'-MAID. 57 

nation and society, 1 leave to you, but for Madame Yariazinka, 1 
demand, an immunity, from 5 ’’our remarks.” 

■” By Jove!” exclaimed Hanleiffli, quite taken aback by the baron’s 
outburst, ” 1 meant no offense, I am sure. Mayn’t a fellow talk?” 

” If, he, will, mind, what, he, says,” said the baron, with much 
knightly valor and determination, for which he was loudly applaud- 
ed by the younger men. 

” But, hang it!” continued Hanleigh, not quite certain that it did 
not behoove him to get very angry, and to take a high hand, ” / do 
not want to interfere with your Madame What’s-her-name or with 
any other person in whom you take an interest, baron. 1 am not 
given to walking into other people’s gardens, and 1 am sure we need 
not come over to the coteaux in search of charmers fair and frisky, 
youthful or mature: they flourish in abundance^ thank you, at 
fau.” 

“ Now don’t go on!” cried Morton. I will not have my cdusin 
prejudiced against the whole of Pau society — now you have doiie 
your best to doom the hunt in his eyes. You and Bebe, Hanleigh, 
have managed to give him anything but a pleasant impression be- 
tween you, so do leave him to make further acquaintance with it 
himself.” 

“ Ah'” began Bebo. “ No, Erie, do not be afraid; give yourself 
a little time — a few sunny da 3 ’’s— and you will soon fall in love with 
Pau, and with all of us. As for society, and charming society, 1 as- 
sure you, just wait a little bit, and you will see there are ‘ brown 
eyes and gray eyes,’ ‘black eyes and blue,’ that before long will 
sparkle on the Place Boy ale, and in the beloved ball-room of the 
Gassion, like unto the stars in the canopy of the heavens of a winter- 
night on the Pyr-enees. ” 

“ Very well said,” remarked the baron, approvingly, feeling it 
was the sort of thing he liked to say himself, and that, in fact, it 
would have come very much better, if he had thought of it, from 
7iim ! Indeed, he, as well as Bebe, was given to much extravagance 
of speech. They would probably have gone on now at any length, 
snatching the thread of conversation jealously from one another; 
but up rose the elderly trio from the table at that moment, and they 
all simultaneously realized the immediate duty of joining the ladies 
in the other room. As they hurried through the hall, finishing the 
fragments of their conversation together, Bebe came sauntering with 
Gilbert behind, and as he went he trolled out in his favorite style of 
philosophic and musical soliloquy the “ results logical ” of the “ dis- 
cussion general ” as it presented itself to him. 

“ Brown eyes or blue eyes, hazel or gray, 

What are the eyes that I drink to-day? 


CHAPTER Yll. 

COURT CARDS. 

In the drawing-room they found Madame la Marquise absorbed in 
a game of “ Patience.” Sitting in the middle of the floor at a small 
card-table, she looked certainly very like an old French picture to- 
night; her hair /m(S, to its highest pitch, her dress beautiful, her 


THE SUN-MAIE. 


58 

jewels sparkling as lier pretty fingers played rapidly across the out- 
spread cards. 

Madame de Veuil and the Comtesse de Beaulieu stood one on 
each side of her, both deeply interested with her in her occupation : 
they were competing with a new “ Patience ” just imported to Pau. 
This w’as an event of the most exciting nature, and one worthy of 
much attention and study. With hand uplifted, the old comtesse 
stood, her eyes flitting eagerly across the shoulder of the_ marquise 
from card to card, while Madame de Veuil pressed the points of her 
fingers to her lips in profound meditation, as the queens, knaves and 
aces mingled themselves in obstinate and despairing confusion. Ex- 
clamations of “Mon Dieu!” “Tiens!” “Doucement; douce- 
ment!” “Hah, c’est epouvantable!” “Mais!” “Ciel!” and 
many other such (equally expressive and assistive) broke unceas- 
ingly from the lips of all the three ladies as their efforts still failed 
in success. Mrs, Carlisle sat also in this group, but her interest in 
their amusement was evidently cool; a faint smile of cynical disap- 
proval sat upon her countenance as these cries of childish excitement 
and enthusiasm burst from the two foreign ladies, and from that 
renegade compatriot of hers who had so fallen from the frigid dig- 
nity due to her nation and her name. 

Miss Carlisle was improving her French accent by conversation 
with Mademoiselle de Veuil, who was a bright, pleasant girl, a taller 
and handsomer edition of her younger sister; and on a sofa, a little 
drawn bick from the card table and its surroundings, sat Madame 
Zophee, listening, with soft answers and sympathetic eyes, to many 
tender little confidences from Jeanne. 

As the gentlemen entered, the marquise looked up from her ab- 
sorbing game. 

“ You wicked persons,” she said, in French, “ what a time you 
have been! I regret infinitely that we bored you so much at dinner 
that you required a long period of refreshment and repose. ’ ’ 

“Ah, madame,” cried Bebe, coming to the front, as usual, at 
once, “ we have had such exciting topics of conversation, we could 
not tear ourselves away. We have been discussing — ‘ Pau society,’ ” 
he added, with affected dignity, “ and we have enlightened Sir Gil- 
bert Erie as to all the pitfafis spread for his destruction.” 

“Discussing Pau society!” exclaimed the marquise, “which 
means that you, you wicked, precocious Bebe, have been talking 
scandal, and saying a great many ill-natured things — you and the 
baron between you. Ah, 1 know you both!” 

“ Ah, madame, de gi'ace!” cried the baron, pausing as he was 
making his way very quietly toward Madame Zophee across the 
room. Pausing unwillingly indeed, but the glove thus so openly 
cast down in challenge to him must needs be at least picked up. 

“ 1 will not have my nephew’s mind poisoned,” the marquise con- 
tinued. “ 1 mean him to enjoy Pau and to love it, and you will 
undermine me, I know, you two with your tongues. ’ ’ 

“ True, madame, true!” cried Bebe. “ ‘ Nil admirari ’ is in these 
days, 1 grant you, the only philosophy that pays; but pray waive 
the dispute for a moment — hold ; what pretty amusement have we 
here? A new Patience— delightful! allow me— may 1 take this 
place?” 


THE SUN* MAID. 


59 


He had glided gently in between Madame de Veuil and the mar- 
quise, and had found a stool pushed under the table by the latter's 
side. He dropped on one knee upon it, and very coolly began to re- 
arrange the packets of cards next to him, for which proceeding his 
fingers were instantly and sharply rapped by the marquise’s fan. 
Vociferous altercations followed in mingled French and English, at 
which the baron stood laughing immoderately, delighted at the dis- 
comfiture of his usual companion-in arms. Bebe declared he knew 
intimately the mysterious ways of this game of Patience, having 
been taught it by an old Frenchman more than a year ago ; while 
madame declared that that was impossible; for it was a newly in- 
vented game, and the prefet himself had shown it to her in strictest 
confidence, when she had dined at the Prefecture only a night or 
two before; she had half forgotten it, but was determined to puzzle 
it out again, and she would not admit the idea of Bebe’s superior 
knowledge, nor be instructed by him on any terms. They wrangled 
away, much to their mutual edification, and to the amusement of 
Gilbert, who lingered in the circle of the lookers-on. 

Meanwhile Morton slipped quietly over and gained the position 
the baron had coveted in Jeanne’s vicinity and by Madame Zophee’s 
side. He satisfied himself by gazing and smiling at the former as 
she sat opposite him, blushing and sparkling with happiness, and 
nestling close to Madame Zophee. It was to the last-named lady 
that he had come to speak. 

“ 1 hope you have forgiven us,” he said, in English, and in a low 
tone, “for having broken our compact, by introducing a stranger 
unjrermitted to you to-night ; it could not be helped, you know. My 
cousin must have taken you into dinner as it happened, according to 
the proper arrangement of the people generally. 1 hope you did not 
mind.” 

“ Not at all,” she answered. “ In fact, I had forgotten our com- 
pact. Somehow, belonging to you, he did not seem a stranger at 
all.” 

“ Then you liked him? 1 am so glad!” 

“ Yes, 1 did, extremely; he is wonderfully pleasant and bright.” 

“ And under which head, pray, does he come in your classifica- 
tion of Englishmen?” 

“ My classification*? 1 do not know— let me see— what did I say 
about Englishmen? 1 do not recollect.” 

“ Well, you are not generally very complimentary to the nation. 
Do you not remember one evening last summer, on the croquet 
ground, you ran down the species ‘ British traveler’ very severely 
indeed?” 

“ Ah ! 1 remember. No, 1 did not do that exactly, did 1? 1 did 
not mean to do so, I am sure, for it would be unjust in me, who 
have seen too few of the nation, to judge. But what 1 think I must 
have said is what 1 have often realized with regret, that the ideal 
Englishman of our youthful fancy, taught by Corinne and such 
rulers of romance, is no more — the man, 1 mean, w'ho comes among 
us in foreign lands to awe and inspire us with a dignity of presence 
and a degree of intellectual culture to which we were unused. A 
wonderful being, was he not? combining everything that was at- 
tractive, according to our ideas. Refined, artistic, reserved, marble 


' THE SU is -MAID. 


in exterior manner and countenance, and full of beautiful and im- 
passioned sentiments, all suppressed below, lie scattered gold in 
rubles around him, for ??a-cA« 2 ^tea-money, I mean— and did not 
know the meaning of the term copeck. lie had marvelous advent- 
ures, too, and did wonderful things, always on a jet-black steed. 
Ah, where has he gone? Do you not remember him? How we did 
admire him! 1 fear he went out of fashion with the post-carriage 
and four fleeting steeds with which he used to travel.” 

” But surely he was a stuck-up fellow,” said Morton. “ 1 do not 
believe 1 should have liked him really. 1 think the present typical 
Englishman, when he is a thorough gentleman, suits me better.” 

“ I dare say,” said Madame Zophee, looking over with her quiet, 
meditative glance to where Gilbert stood, bending over his aunt’s 
shoulder and her frise head, his eyes glistening with amusement as 
he watched the game. “You may be right. 1 think i should like 
that type if 1 knew it well; there is something wonderfully fresh 
and happy about the character. But wiien 1 spoke of Englishmen 
last summer, vicomte, 1 know what 1 was thinking — of Paris, and 
of months 1 have spent there, and of Baden and Homburg, and 
even of St. Petersburg too. The English of whom I have seen 
something in these places clid not make me admire their country or 
themselves: most of them were men ignorant of art and insensible 
to historic association or natural beauty, or anything that used to 
bring my grand old English hero abroad in his chariot; and they 
seemed to like only to give us to understand that they were ‘ tout ce 
qu’ii y a de plus Parisien,’ in all the knowledge and tastes and hab- 
its which are of Paris the perdition and doom. And they used to 
boast — how do you say it?” 

” Swagger,” suggested Morton. 

“ Well, yes, so— of the money they lose at Baden and Monaco, 
and of the places where they amuse themselves, of which in our so- 
ciety we do not speak at all; and so, altogether, they seemed to me 
but a poor edition of the worst form of Russian, who at least carries 
off his extravagance and his gamblings with that dignity and mag- 
nificence by which he notoriously ruins himself en prince. ’ ’ 

“You have seen a bad side of my mother’s countrymen, I fear,” 
said Morton. “ 1 hope Gilbert will persuade you to alter some of 
your views.” 

“I should like to do so. When 1 was young, 1 was very enthu- 
siastic for England, because at my guardian’s 1 read so inany En- 
glish papers and booles. I was disappointed when we went into so- 
ciety in Baden and Paris, 1 can assure you.” 

“ But indeed, that is only one type of the nation, madame; there 
are others as well.” 

“ Yes, 1 know. In Russia once at my guardian’s, 1 saw another 
type— he was ‘ an English bear;’ he came with a letter to us; but he 
was worse, 1 think — not my old dear hero at all, though he was very- 
learned indeed, and full o*f ideas and notions. Oh ! but so rough, 
and disliking so much the drawing-room and the ladies.^ old or 
young, and always saying so. I remember how my little cousin, the 
Comtesse Zaida, was furious, bhe did not think the man lived, I 
can tell you, who could resist her smiles; biit/^e did; he often turned 
his back upon her in her own reception room, and talked to her fa- 


THE SUN-MAID. 


ther (my guardian) about governments, and taxes, and serious liter- 
ature, in an obstinate, dogmatic, uncomplimentary way that little 
Zaida thought unsuitable to her presence indeed. I did not mind 
hiTTi so much, because 1 was a little interested; he spoke well, and 
he had much to say, but 1 did not like him. No. He had none of 
the graces of life in his address or person, and 1 did not admire the 
type. And yet the embassador said, 1 remember, one evening, to 
my guardian, that excepting for the taint, as he called it, of Jiculi- 
calism in the character, it was about the best type of man they were 
sending out of the universities in England in those days ; he said he 
was great intellectually, and 1 was very sorry, for 1 did not like him 


at all.” . , 

“ Well, 1 must say you cannot classify my cousin under either 
head,” said Morton. 

” No, no, indeed. 1 like him, 1 think I do, very much. But he 
is so very young. He is not as old as you are, vicomte, surely not?” 

“ He is just about it, but he is young, somehow, and more so in 
manner and mind than in absolute looks; that is, you see, madame, 
because, as we say in English, he has been tied all his life to his 
mother’s apron strings.” 

“ You mean he has been always at home, he is campagnard, rus- 
tic ; but he is not at all commonplace, all the same. Ah ! how can 
one be so youthful and look so happy as that?’’ she asked suddenly, 
pointing to Gilbert’s face glowing with merriment just opposite to 

” He is a dear jolly fellow,” said Morton, with mo8t_ earnest affec- 
tion and approval, ‘ ‘ and I am sure, madame, there is a great deal 
besides all that fun in him too — it will come out. I believe tliere is 
often just as much underneath in the character of Englishmen, now 
that they hide it with that John Bull cheeriness, as there used to bo 
in your old-day hero who shut himself up in a stony reserve, it is 
reserve all the same, I fancy, in reality — 1 have enough of the En- 
glishiran in me, madame, to realize that. Eh! do you not agTee 
with me? Observing 7iim, for instance, now?” 

“ Yes, 1 do. To speak artistically, Mousieur^ Morton, and with 
out pretense at any special power of penetration into character, there 
is a great deal more than the reflection of his laugh in the changeful 
light and shade of his blue eyes; and observing artistically as I say, 
if 1 wished to paint my ideal of Uavidov, our 3^oung soldier-poet— the 
Korner of our Russia— I should like to have my model for the ex- 
pression I should want from that bright, brave glance, and from a 
peculiarly sensitive curl and quiver of the upper lip which w^as one 
of the first things 1 remarked in your cousin s profile as he sat next 
me for jitst one moment in silence at dinner to-night. But dear me! 
here he comes toward us, and we must try to look as if we had not 
been discussing him in every possible light, philosophic and artistic, 
to say nothing of characteristic and national.” ^ ^ 

“Ha, Gilbert! take my place,” said Morton, rising with ready 
alacrity and a happy unconsciousness of manner as his cousin ap- 
proached; a proposal that was less unselfish than it appea^red, for 
there was an opposite corner of the sofa vacant on little Jeanne s 
other side. It looked most suitable for himself, he thought, if he 
thus magnanimously resigned Madame Zophce to Gilbert. ^ 


THE SUN HAID. 


62 

But it was all too late to be of much avail on Gilbert’s behalf. A 
veiy pleasing impression remaining in his_ mind froui their intro- 
ductory conversation during dinner had inclined him often to glance 
toward the corner where his cousin and Madame Zophee sat in such 
confidential and comfortaole-looking converse, and had disposed him 
many times to desert the merry party at the card-table, and to join 
them over there. But he delayed the move too long, as it turned out, 
for he had but just dropped into IMorton’s profiered seat, feeling 
particular satisfaction in doing so, when the door opened, and the 
groom of the chambers of the marquis glided in to whisper mys- 
terious announcements to the Comte de Beaulieu, Monsieur de 
Veuil, and others. Following him came Baptiste, who walked over 
to that special corner at which Gilbert had at last arrived, and in- 
formed them in suppressed tones ot extreme confidence, that. “ the 
carriage of Madame Yariazinka awaited her.” 

The pleasant dinner party was over. 

” Oh not yet,” remonstrated Gilbert. ” Surely it is quite early still. 
Kot just yet, please” — for Madame Zophee had moved immediately. 

“ Yes, at once it must be. You remember 1 told you my horses 
are favorites, and surely you of all people would not wish me to 
keep them waiting.” 

” Ah, of course not; I never thought of that. 1 am so sorry. But, 
at all events, 1 may go to the door and see your horses, may 1 not?” 
he added, rising to make way for her and to offer her his arm. 

‘‘You may. My Yasilie will be proud of the attention, only I 
fear it is rather dark. Stay a moment — 1 must say a number of 
good-nights.” 

And there were many to say. First to the marquise, who infolded 
her in a kindly embrace, complaining bitterly the while of Bebe and 
his tiresome ways. Then to all the rest— a" smile, a friendly hand- 
clasp, or a gracious bow; and finally there was the baron, who first 
kissed her small soft hand, and then held it long between both of his 
own, caressing it gently, and murmuring, ‘‘ Prastchite, prastchite, 
galoupka moja” (‘‘ I'arewell, farewell, my dove”), while she smiled 
and answered the old man’s fatherly kindness with grateful eyes and 
many soft Russian words. 

Then at last Gilbert possessed himself of her completely, and led 
her triumphantly from the room, the marquis and Morton lingering 
(as they saw her under safe escort) to make farewell speeches and 
compliments to their remaining guests. 

In the hall Gilbert had only time to say, “ How selfishly Morton has 
absorbed you the whole evening, to be sure!” when conversation 
was arrested, for they came upon Baptiste obtruding himself with 
madame’s equipments much in front of the row of other domestics, 
who were assembled now again to help the guests to depart. 

Next to Baptiste stood a very tall man in a peculiar costume, with 
a fair, ruoged countenance, very strongly in contrast to all those 
around him. He bowed lower than any of them as Madame Zophee 
approached, and she smiled when she saw him, and said, ‘‘ Ah, 
Yasilie!” adding some wwds in Russian. He answered, ” Sluches” 
‘‘ I hear and obey”), and immediately walked to the door, flung it 
open, and disclosed the bright lights of the carriage without. At the 
samo moment the huge head of an immense mastiff appeared round 


. / 


THE SUH-MAID. 


63 


the corner, obtruding hMulself humbly, but with very longing gaze, 
into the hall. 

“Oh, you beauty!” cried Gilbert, drawing Madame Zophee’s 
glance toward the entrance as he spoke. 

“ You naughty Lustoff!” she said. “ Who gave you leave to come 
here? No— do not come in, sir, do not come in,” for one big paw 
was immediately laid upon the inner step as she raised her voice. 
“ Do not come in. For shame!” she continued, and the paw was 
withdrawn again, while the big face and the brown eyes looked 
wistful and disconsolate. 

“ My love, 1 am coming,” she called to him, in a soothing voice, 
and, “Thank you. Sir Gilbert,” she added, as he wrapped her 
closely in her swan’s-down mantle. 

The white feathery ruft came up close round her neck, and was 
so becoming that she looked prettier than ever in it, and more un- 
common even than she had done before. 

“ How deliciously soft and warm!” he exclaimed, admiringly. 

“ Yes, it is warm — a medium, you know. I thought it too hot 
still to think of fur. Now will you put this on for me? But 1 do 
not believe that you can.” 

“ Why, what is it?” he said, taking from her and turning about 
awkwardly in his fingers a piece of soft crimson material, all em- 
broidered with delicate tracings of silver and gold. “ Please — oh, 1 
cannot. Where is the opening?” 

They both laughed, and then she showed him, twisting it dex- 
terously, and throwing it over her head. 

“ It is a Baschlik,” she said, still laughing at his difficulties. “ It 
is the old national head-dress of the women of Russia. 1 bought 
this one at the Gastinnoi Dvor— the bazaar, I mean— at Moscow, and 
1 think it makes such a cozy head-covering for evening dissipation- 
do not you?” 

He thought she looked too enchanting for anything, thus hooded 
and cloaked, and he laughed merrily again, and exclaimed, “ Why, 
you would do now for a masquerade in that costurne, 1 declare!” 

“1 dare say 1 should; but 1 am not going to one just at this 
moment, only home to bed. And all this time my Volga and 
Vazuza are waiting, and Yasilie and Ivan must think 1 have a heart 
of stone.” 

He gave her his arm again, and out they went to the porch en- 
trance, where there stood waiting for her the daintiest of little 
broughams. The door was being held open by the big Yasilie; a 
pair of dark bay horses, driven by an(»ther man in a similar costume, 
were champing their bits impatiently at the delay ; and there was 
Lustoff, ineffectually held back by Yasilie’s hand, scrambling for- 
ward with a rush to rub his head against Madame Zophee’s dress 
she passed him into the carriage. r i'x ^ 

“ annri finer — rlnwn ! Now. as vou Jiave come. vou. i'nay\m''ti,’^ 






64 


/ 


THE SUK-MA.ID. 


illuminated its way; and a little behind it might be seen the dark 
form of LustotT trotting slowly along, a faithful and untiring guard. 
And so they all rolled into the distance through the beautiful still 
autumn night, under the splendid canopy of the dark-blue heavens 
with its myriad of clear, glittering stars, until the shade of the hang- 
ing boughs absorbed the lamp-lights, and hid them completely from 
Gilbert’s view. Then he turned with a short and unconscious sigh, 
just as Morton with a train of other ladies and gentlemen came 
trooping up to the door. Other carriages were called, last ggod' 
nights were said, ladies were handed in and gentlemen sprung after 
them, and in ten minutes every guest vms gone. 



it all capital fun. 1 was amused immensely, 1 can assure yon, fropi 

the beginning of the evening to the end.’’ ^ 

Mor\on looked at him curiously, at his placid and hfe-enjoymg 
countenance, not self -satisfied, and thevefore not irritating in the 
least, but contented, complacent, and, as he said to himself, 
“amused.” Madame Zophee was right; Gilbert was wenderfullj 
young in his way of looking at life. Had he never, thought Mor- 
ton, done anything but amuse himself? IN ever felt a sentiment 
stronger toward anything than these two extremes of his, “ a bore ” 
or ‘ ‘ immense fun ” ? 

“ You got on with your neighbor at dinner?” IMorton continued. 

“Oh, dear, yes. How nice she is! Quite different, you know, 
from anybody 1 have ever seen before. ’ ’ 

“ 1 dare say, ” said Morton. “And you will not see many like 
her in time to come.” 

“ No? Why should 1 not? Are not most Russians like her? 1 
•was just thinking they must be a very pleasant sort of nation.” 

“ She is not altogether Russian, I fancy,” said Morton. 

“ Really!” said Gilbert, between the puffings of his cloudy pipe. 
“ Really!” 

It did not seem to him to convey much, one way or the other, 
whether she was Russian or not, only he did not exactly see any- 
thing more extraordinary or out of the way— to his mind — that she 
could possibly be. 

“ No, ] fancy not,” continued Morton. “You see,” he went on, 
meditatively, with interest, as if the subject had been one of fre- 
quent reflection with him, “ there are a great many points about her 
that are not Russian at all, and little things she h^ often said con- 
^ firm me in the opinion, though, of course, one always is so careful 
to draw toward subjects in conversation that would make her 
Ji^'^^^ei^weie trying to dive. But I sometimes think that she is 

g ■^,^'''^^^ 11 , yes!” exclaimed Gilbert, with sudden energy, as 

to Russm inspiration. “ Of course, Poland is^ quite close 

widely ^diff ere’' years ago, being one or the other was a 

^ fighting,” said Gilbert, decisively, 

■oas she n^old you all that in these years?” 


THE SU:S[-HAID. 


65 

“ Not a word. In fact, you would be astonished, Gilbert, if you 
could realize how absolutely nothin^’ — nothing at all — we know 
about^her, though she has lived at our park-gates there for five years. ’ ’ 
You mean you do not know who she is, and all that?” ex- 
claimed Gilbert, opening his eyes very wide indeed, and sitting bolt- 
upright in his luxurious smoking- chair in real disregard of his pipe. 

“Not a bit,” said Morton. “ Who she is, who her father or 
mother was, or who her husband was, or whether she ever had one, 
or anything about him. No; 1 am wrong in saying we do not know 
if she ever had a husband, because she says she has, and,” he added, 
enthusiastically, “ she is as true as gold.” 

“How extraordinary!” exclaimed Gilbert ; “why, it is like a 
book! But, by, Jove! of course Baron Keffel knows; he has been 
in Russia. Why don’t you ask him, Morton?” 

“ Because he knows nothing — no more than we do. He has only 
traveled once a little in Russia, and got up a few words of the 
language, but he knows nothing at all of the people : in fact, that is 
just what travelers do not do in an ordinary way. It takes more 
than a journey from Archangel to Kasan to know the very outermost 
run of Russian society. No, he has only fallen in love with her, 
like everybody else about here.” 

‘ ‘ But, ’ ’ continued Gilbert, on whose organs of bewilderment these 
communications had made a great impression — swamping, indeed, 
for the moment, all individual interest in the lady i^er se — “ could 
not you find out? could not you make inquiries?” 

“ Yes,” said Morton, with much indignation, “I dare say we 
could. I suppose if you had such a neighbor in England, you would 
set ‘ Pollaky’s Private ’ to work; but that is not what we call friend- 
ship or hospitality here on the Pyrenees. No; we take her for her- 
self, and are thankful when she will deign to let us have anything at 
all of her. Five years is enough to prove a person, I think, without 
asking questions or showing impertinent curiosity.” 

“ But it is so extraordinary.” 

“ It IS ; but so it is, ’ ’ continued Morton. ‘ ‘ When my mother came 
to like her so much, and to try to draw her here at the beginning, 
she told her plainly one day that if she wished to have her, we must 
take her on her own ground simply and for herself. She allowed 
there was mystery; §lie made no secret of that; but she said she 
could tell nothing then or at any time, and we forbore questioning 
of course. And so 'we know nothing more of her to-night, Gilbert, 
than we knew five years ago — except that we know more fully, what 
we then discerned, that she is the best and sweetest woman that ever 
breathed, and ten times worthy of all the confidence that_ is placed 
in her. The Princess — you know whom I mean, ‘ our Princess,’ at 
Pan — knows a little more about her than we do, but not much. She 
had a letter from some very great Russian people when Madame 
Zophee came here, speaking of her, and recommending her to 
friendly notice. The Princess was very kind to her from the first, 
which is not wonderful, because is kind to everybody, and would 

be certainly especially so to any one lonely and desolate as INIadame 
Zophee appeared to be ; but now, apart from kindness, she is quite 
as fond of her as we are. Indeed, I, beyond liking, honor Madame 
e 


66 


THE SUX-MAID. 


Zopliee very much, and the life that she leads here. She is always 
doing some one good. ’ ’ 

“ She is very charming no doubt,” said Gilbert, who had gone 
comfortably back to his pipe. 

” She is,” said Morton; and then he went on, evidently inclined, 
probably under Jeanne’s inliuence as well as Madame Zophee’s, to 
be a little sentimental to-night. ” She is, and she has behaved so 
well altogether. You know I got awfully hard hit when she first 
came here, though 1 had cared for Jeanne since she was a child. 
But Jeanne was away at school, and there was Madame Zophee in 
and out with my mother, and adored by her, and if she had liked it 
just then Jeanne’s chances of my fidelity were gone. But she did 
do it wonderfully (Madame Zophee, 1 mean) — wonderfully, never 
seemed to see it, you know; but, somehow, just quietly and imper- 
ceptibly, her coming ceased to be, and when I have been at home 
she has never dined here, not once until to-night. It was so grace- 
ful of her to come too, 1 think. Jeanne adores her, and some way 
or other she has managed to develop in my mind into the sweetest 
and dearest of friends.” 

” 1 think you are a very lucky fellow, Morton,” said Gilbert, in 
answer, in tones philosophic, but also very contented indeed, shak- 
ing the dust out of his pipe the while, and emitting a yawn that was 
most suggestive. He eyed his cousin a little curiously too, and was, 
in fact, making the mental observation that ” It was true, after all 
— Morton was sentimental, certainly; but then, you know, it must 
not be forgotten that he was halt French.” 


CHAPTER VIII. 

THE PRINCESS OF THE CHALET. 

It vras astonishing how much more at home that little dinner 
made Gilbert feel with them all when they met next morning at the 
late combination of breakfast and luncheon which the marquise had 
established as a compromise between habits English and French. 
He felt au fait with the social politics of Pau; he could discuss the 
eccentricities of the old baron, the absurdity of Bebe Beresford, and 
the snobbishness of Captain Hanleigh, much to Morton’s satisfaction 
and his own. The marquise was highly indignant, when the after- 
dinner conversation w’as repeated to her, to find that Pau sports had 
been run down, and Pau matrons and widows submitted to sarcas- 
tic criticism. 

“ Do not listen to a word of it all, Gilbert!” she exclaimed, as she 
sipped her Sauterne and picked daintily at her coteUtte panee ; ” not 
to a single word of it. There is nobody to be found at Pau — look- 
ing, if you must, on the shadiest side of the social picture— of whom 
you will not find the parallel in any similar community collected for 
mutual entertainment in every other part of Europe, England, or 
elsewhere. People need not lose their money over baccarat at the 
Cefcle Frangais, or over whist and ecarte at the English Club to any 
scamp that turns up, unless they please to do so ; and if they do, 
why, they are geese, my dear, and they would do it anywhere else if 
they did not do It at Pau. And as to the ladies — ” 


HE SUX-MAID. 


67 


“ Ob,” said Morton, wandering round the table to help himself 
from a Bordeaux pate on the other side, ‘‘ no fear of Gilbert on that 
account, mother. He has been so fascinated with that song of 
Bebe’s about ‘ brown eyes and black ej'es, gray eyes and blue,’ that 
he is consumed with impatience for the first band-day, that he may 
see them all paraded, and make a selection of his shrine for the win- 
ter’s adoration — eh, Gilbert?” 

“lam sure 1 do not know what may become of me before the 
winter sets fairly in,” said Gilbert. 

“Now that is nonsense! That is all Bebe’s fault, and the 
baron’s, and that horrid Captain Hauleigh’s,” cried the marquise. 
“ You will not commit yourself, after all they have said. 1 know 
where you will be when the winter sets in — just in the Rue du 
Lycee, Pau, my dear nephew, and nowhere else, and you will be 
delighted to be there, and very much amused. Is that not true, 
Leon? Speak, vvilt thou not? Say, must not Gilbert stay here?” 

“ Certainly, certainly,” answered the marquis, who, like any ex- 
cellent paterfamilias of a British fireside, had been much absorbed 
all this time in the perusal of his morning paper, the Echo des 
Pyrenees. “ Gilbert had better come with me to-day, Yiolette. I 
must go into Pau and IVIorton aJso. It is the prefet’s first reception- 
day since his return. Gilbert must be presented to him.” 

“ Good gracious!” cried Gilbert. “ What an ordeal! Must I go 
through it, and necessarily to-day?” 

“ You must go through it, my dear,” said his aunt, “ because the 
prefet and Madame de Frontignac are very charming people, and 
their evening receptions are delightful; but 1 do not see that it is 
imperative you should go to-day — is it, Leon?” 

‘ ‘ I must go, cherie, ’ ' he answered, ‘ ‘ and Morton must accom- 
pany me. As W Geelbert, he can do as he please. 1 will tell the 
prefet of him, and say, if you like, that he remains with you to-day, 
Violette. and will pay his respects at another time. The next Sun- 
day or Tliuisday will be soon enough; but Morton and I must not 
delay.” 

“ Well, that is a nuisance,” said 3Iorton, impatiently. “ Gilbert 
and 1 were going to have had a long ride to-day on Mike and Dinah, 
and we were to come round upon Chateau de Y euil to visit Jeanne 
and her people in the afternoon. What a bore, father! Must 1 
really go?” 

“ Assuredly, Morton, without fail; you must indeed. _ 

“Ah, well, it cannot be helped, then; and, Gilbert, if you don’t 
care about coming into town to day, you must just ride alone.” 

“ W^ell, 1 must say I like this side of the country a good deal the 
best of the two as yet,” said Gilbert. “ 1 should enjoy poking about 
a bit on Dinah’s back, if 1 may take her, Morton. It is awfully 


“ Nonsense, my dear fellow. The stable is at your service; take 
what you like. Dinah would be the best, 1 dare say; and 1 can just 
point out a capital round for you, which we can trace clearly in the 
view from the court-yard gate, that will give you a ride of about 
three hours over a beautiful bit of country.” 

“ Then dear child,” said the marquise, in soft tones, as she rose 
slowly from the table, “ 1 will not invite you to ‘ dowager ’ in the 


G8 


THE SUH-MAID. 


barouche with me; but after your ride, if you like to give your old 
aunt an arm for a quarter of an hour, you know where to find me, 
on the terrace at my evening promenade.” 

The marquis and Morton soon started down the avenue in the 
stanhope, and went bowling at a tine page into town; while Gilbert, 
after prolonged colloquies with Joe over French and English bits 
and br idlings, and all the national differences and peculiarities in 
details of equestrian management, mounted at length upon the 
broad, fat back of Mistress Dinah, and rode slowly out of the stable- 
yard. 

It was a splendid afternoon, such autumn weather as is peculiar 
to the slopes of the Pyrenees, and is worth a long journey to enjoy. 
Radiant sunshine gladdened the valleys and wrapped the mountain- 
tops in a silver glory. The sweeping bi’anches of the oak and beech 
trees made abundant shadow as he rode beneath them, and the 
sweet mountain air met him as he cantered slowly up the gently 
sloping sides of the undulating hills, fresh and delicious, cooling 
pleasantly the atmosphere after'the fiery rays of the midday sun. 

There was endless variety in the ride, and at each moment some 
fresh object to amuse or interest caught his eyes ^s he dipped into a 
valley, or topped the low summit of a hill. Morton had pointed out 
the way carefully to him, and, by watchrng certain conspicuous 
landmarks, he found himself winding through the coteaux over a 
vast extent of ground, and coming constantly rrpon new views of 
the distant mountains, and new openings in the valleys. 

St. Hilaire, and Chateau de Beaulieu, and Montplaisir, and the 
villa of the De Veuils, always remained in sight, towering upon 
their different summits; although, as he wound through the country 
below them, and crossed or circumvented the woody hills, they 
seemed to change their position continually, and to present them- 
selves in fresh aspects from each new point of view. 

Sometimes he passed through a bit of somber, monotonous pine- 
wood, and then again he would emerge upon a gentle descent into a 
sylvan glade, traverse, perhaps, a stretch of green meadow -land, and 
then wind along for miles by a glistening stream, enjoying the de- 
licious murmur as it fell gently on his ear, wondering over the 
excessive purity of the transparent water and the marvelous tints of 
beryl and emerald which it had gained tar away high up among the 
melting snows. 

Often he passed a peasant settlement lying on the hill slope above 
him — a cozy, well-built cottage, ugly, indeed, as to architecture, but 
picturesque withal from the rich autumn tints of the leaves on the 
creepers that clustered thickly over lattice and door; a big dog; a 
goat tethered to the palings, and nibbling at the sprouting edges of 
the path; an old woman cutting cabbage into a red earthen pot; a 
group of brown-legged children; a girl leaning idly at the porch, 
with a laughing look in her black eyes, and a bright handkerchief 
knotted round her head — one or all of these gave to each wayside 
cottage action and color and life. Ascending a deep gorge that 
reached seemingly far into the countrj^ he met a band of ‘ ‘ bergers ’ ’ 
— the mountain shepherds, coming down into the lowlands with 
their heids — wild, pictuiesque-looking fellows, dressed in their 
native costumes, with tight gray breeches and un tanned leather gait- 


THE SUK-HAID. 


69 


ers, with odd-shaped hanging caps on their heads, and with crimson 
sashes tied loosely about their waists. Endless ox-carts, too, came 
slowly toward him, sending the familiar music of their tinkling 
beds before them, heralding their approach, as they came round "a 
shady corner, or wound through the depth of a valley below. He 
passed many maize-fields, where the men w^ere gathering the last 
relics of the autumn harvest, and loading high the ox-carts with the 
rich golden grain ; and vineyards on every side covered the sunny 
slopes, but the purple fruit was already garnered, and the leaves 
were falling in a crimson and russet shower all over the ground. 

He enjoyed the ride; and in this new country, surrounded by 
such novel influences of scenery and coloring, and light and shade, 
he enjoyed the solitude. He was accustomed to ride alone, and in 
action and movement he enjoyed even the silence. Breathing the soft, 
soothing air, his glance wandering over hill and dale, mountain and 
river and wood, watching the light become rosy and deep as soft 
billowy clouds gathered over the hill- tops and the sun began to set, 
he felt all the while, without attempting to express to himself or to 
realize it, that the scenery and sunlight and all the soft atmospheric 
influences were creeping over his spirit, and reaching the very life- 
springs of his whole heart and being, creating infinite new thoughts 
and sentiments, throwing strange reflections, vague and shadowy, 
across his dreams, striking deep somewhere within him musical and 
poetic keys that vibrated in answer with an intense and thrilling 
power that was sweet as it was unfamiliar. 

The sun was setting, indeed, when he at last began to wonder 
whether he was far from home. He had wound through meadow 
and valle}^ and by vineyard and stream, so long now, and he had 
turned round by Chateau Beaulieu just, he thought, as Morton had 
directed him, and yet he did not appear to be getting any nearer to the 
lodge and park- gates of St. Hilaire, nor did he seem to be approach- 
ing it from the right side. It was, in fact, easy enough to lake a 
wrong turning, and thus to lose one’s way in these winding paths 
of thecoteaux; and so, having drifted into a pleasant dream-land, 
as he rode along, Gilbert had very naturally done it. 

So far from being now in the direct road to Chateau St. Hilaire 
and approaching it by the south entrance, as he had intended, so 
passing up by the paddock and court -yard, to leave Dinah at the 
stable-door, he had wandered over to the west, and Pic de Bigorre 
lay now behind him, while he was really breasting the <ascent toward 
St. Hilaire out of the valley on the side below the terrace walk. He ^ 
had been there only the night before with the marquise, and had 
watched the sunset view, as it appeared in this aspect, and he ought 
to have knowm it, but he did not; the road seemed very unfamiliar, 
and he did not at all realize how he was to reach home. 

Suddenly the c-orner of a garden wall attracted him — an old, 
lichen-grown wall, with rich flowering creepers hanging low over it, 
and beautiful almond and acacia trees towering beyond. 

“lam outside the garden of St. Hilaire, no doubt,” he thought 
to himself, as he looked up and saw the chateau on the hill above; 
and as Dinah seemed to know the way, and stepped briskh’- on, he 
felt satisfied, and let her skirt round the wall and under the'shaclow 
of the hanging creepers as fast iis she pleased. 


70 


THE SUH-MAID. 


The shrubs topping the creepers tliickened presently, and clusters 
of roses appeared between them; rich festoons of the “ Malmaison,” 
long, hanging branches of the crimson “ Geante ” and of the 
golden “ Gloire,” twined and rambled with careless and wonderful 
luxury amidst the acacia and almond trees, flis head nearly 
reached them as he rode along; he could have stretched out his 
hand easily, and robbed the bright rose-garden, but he only looked 
in as he passed, wonderingly and admiringly, and enjoyed the de- 
licious flower-scents that filled the soft evening air. Suddenly Dinah 
stopped, cocked her ears inquiringly, and threw up her head, for 
the rose-branches just above her were shaken violently, and a 
shower of crimson petals fell upon the sunny road. Gilbert urged 
her on ; a few paces she advanced, then rounded a corner, and this 
time he himself stopped her again suddenly. 

They had come upon a gate^way; upon stone pillars covered thick 
with roses: upon an opening stretching back through a garden 
where a pathway, leading between greensward and clustem of 
bright-colored flowers, reached to the open window of a low, 
curious house. Pointed gables, faced with wood in carved pictur- 
esque devices, fronted the gate-way. Wooden balconies crossed 
below the upper windows, and wooden pillars supported the porch- 
top. Not in the least a Bearnais house, a fanciful structure appar- 
ently; and— as he now realized, recollecting and recognizing at the 
same moment — evidently his uncle’s favorite extravagance, the 
Swiss chalet, and as evidently Madame Zophee’s house. It was 
wonderfully pretty, lying on the edge of the hill, with the vine-cov- 
ered slope rising above it, and a peep through the gorges toward the 
mountain opening in the view beyond. Flooded by the sweet light 
of the autumn sunset, framed in rich coloring by the scarlet vir- 
ginia creepers, the fading western leaves, and the hanging tendrils 
of the vine, it lay seemingly embowered in verdure, in roses, and in 
brilliant and wondrous flower-tints of every shade and hue. 

Removing all doubt as to its ownership, there, on the soft green- 
-sward before the open window, lay Lustoff ; and in another moment 
the rose-branches rustled and shed their petals again, and out from 
among the bushes came Madame Zophee herself. Her while dress 
swept over the short grass; a snowy Pyrenean shawl, knit in soft 
fluffy wool, was thrown across her "shoulders and wrapped close 
about her neck ; she had a bunch of crimson roses in her hand ; her 
cheek was a little flushed in her exertions to reach them, and her 
eyes ^ycre glistening softly in the deep evening light. 

“ Sir Gilbert Erie!” she said, in her low, clear voice, as if slightly 
but very calmly surprised to see him. 

He took his hat off and bowed, and answered, “ Good-evening, 
Madame Zophee,” which, in his astonishment was all that occurred 
to him to sa3^ 

“What are you doing,” she continued, smiling a little at him 
across the barrier of Uie closed gate, as he sat there on Dinah’s broad 
back, with his hat still in his hand, looking admiringly about him — 

' doing upon my private road?” 

“ lour road, Madame Zophee? 1 really beg your pardon, but do 
you know, 1 have lost my way.” 

“ And most effectually loo, ” she answered, “ if j-ou hope to reach 


THE SUH-MAID. 


71 

St. Hilaire on liorseback by this road. You are really quite wrong: 
you turned out of the proper path about half a mile below. This is 
my right of way, Sir Gilbert; this carriage approach leads only 
to my house. ’ ’ 

“ 1 am sure 1 beg your pardon,” he said, again. “I am very 
sorry; but if you will forgive, 1 do not think that, after all, 1 can 
really regret it so very, very much, for it u so lovely here.” 

” Yes, the view is charming, is it not? It quite worth your 
while just to ride up to see it; and if you will be very grateful 1 will 
fetch my key and let you in by the gate below the marquis’s walk 
into the grounds of St. Hilaire; and if you do not mind leading your 
horse, you can get through the shrubbery up to the stables by that 
way. It will save you a round of quite a mile. ” 

‘‘Thank you so much,” he answered. “1 have been very 
stupid.” 

‘ ‘ It was easy to make the mistake you did ; the two roads are so 
exactly the same. If you do not mind waiting, 1 will fetch the key 
in one moment.” 

‘‘ Thank you. I am so vexed to trouble you. But please do not 
go just yet; let me look for one minute more into your garden. How’ 
beautiful it is!” 

‘‘ Yes, my flowers have done well this year; we had plenty of rain 
in the spring. But these rose-bushes do grow so fast, and then the 
best bloom is always so very high, quite on the top. Look, 1 have 
been struggling for the last half-hour with these large red ones, and 
1 have only managed to reach this one bunch. ’ ’ 

He had sprung from his lioree before she had finished the sentence, 
and had thrown the rein over the pillar by the gate side. 

‘‘May 1 not help you?” he said, ‘‘Look! 1 can reach huge, 
splendid clusters even from this side, and 1 see beauties just over 
the wall. IMay I come in? I will gather them for you, as many as 
you please.” 

He laid his hand on the upper bar as he spoke, where her small 
white one lay already, and he looked longingly across at her, and 
into the garden, where broad sheets of golden light from the slanting 
rays of the low setting sun were stretching across the grass and 
glistening through the evening mists that were gathering under the 
shady hill. 

‘‘ May I not come in?” he repeated. 

She, too, was looking up at him, her darkly shadowed eyes reflect- 
ing that warm sun -glow, the color deepening on her cheek, as he re- 
peated the question. 

‘ ‘ 1 think, ’ ’ she said, laughing lightly, ‘ ‘ that you might have waited 
till you were invited, monsieur; you know 1 never have visitors. 
And then,” she added, as if conclusively, “ you m?i7wneave your 
horse.” 

” Oh yes, 1 can! Dinah evidently prefers standing to moving; 
just look at her, and Morton says she does just as well by heiself. 
Let me only gather that one big bunch there for you; it looks so 
tempting hanging just above your head.” 

“ Yes, just above,” she answered; ‘‘ but just high enough to be 
beyond me. 1 have been gazing longingly at it this last half-hour. 


THE SUH-HAID. 


n 

Well, come in, then. Will you gather it for me? Thank you; you 
are very good. ” ^ . j 

He looked so bright and cheerful and unconscious as he fceu up 
Dinah to the stone gate-post, that she pushed open the gate and ad- 
mitted him, with some mental assurance to herself concerning his 
youth and inexperience. There was the same re-assuring boyishness 
in his enjoyment, too, when he found himself once within the gar- 
den. It was that something so practical and straightforward in his 
manner, as he looked around him and admired, that, as she Hiougnt, 
made intercourse with him so pleasant and easy. Conversation came 
so readily, and it always remained so safely external, so far away 
from that region of the sentimental, which, with his cousin, and 
with most of his cousin’s nation, at all events in kuiguage, was so 
quickly reached. There was a sense of security which she felt to 
be mutual, and with this there was also a sense of enjoyment on her 
side of his sunny looks, and cheerful smiles, and eager, hearty ex- 
pressions, that formed a temptation to which she yielded, though 
hesitatingly, as she drew the gate open, and he passed in. 

Then he gathered roses for her, his tall height reaching the rich 
clusters that grew far up against the sky, and he filled her hands 
with them, in glorious masses of crimson and gold until she could 
hold no more. Yet still he gathered, and she stood by him, and 
exclaimed with delight as the long, hanging branches were drawn 
within her reach, and the fading petals from the full-blown flowers 
fell in soft-colored showers on the greensward at her feet. 

Soon his hands were full also, and he turned to her smilingly 
again. 

“ \Yill that do?” he said. 

“ Thanks many times. I am so glad! I did so want to fill all my 
vases to-night; and Vasilie and Ivan gather so roughly, they make 
all the netals fall.” 

“ 1 fear 1 have brought down a great many,” he answered, look- 
ing at the tinted carpet between them. 

“ No, you have not; that is only natural; they must come down. 
They are nearly over now, they are all so full-blown. And, ah dear! 
how 1 shall miss them when they are quite gone!” 

“ Now 1 must carry them in for you,” continued Gilbert. “ What 
will you do with them all?” 

“ Fill my vases with them; it is just what 1 like. Will you carry 
them? Oh, thank you! But — no, never mind; leave them on the 
grass here, and my Marfa shall fetch them in. 1 must not keep 
you.” 

‘ ‘ Please do not say so. Look ! 1 have got them all so nicely to- 
gether in this great bunch, may 1 not carry them as they are? It 
woufd be such a pity to lay them down. Let me — do let me take 
them just to your window.” 

” Will you? Come, then, and you shall see how I arrange them 
in my huge jasper vase.” 

And then she turned and walked up the little pathway, he follow- 
ing closely and picking up a few scattered roses as he went that had 
fallen from his hand upon the turf. 

” Do you like my little house, Sir Gilbert?” she said, presently. 
“ I hope you do, I am so fond of it.” 


THE SUX-MAID. 


73 


“ 1 think it is perfectly delicious!” he exclaimed; ” it is so pretty 
and picturesque, and 1 never saw such flowers. ’ ’ 

“It is not commonplace, at all events,” she answered, as she 
paused beside him on the narrow way and looked up at the win- 
dows. ” And it is so pleasant having this glass door opening into the 
garden. This stone step is my favorite seat; and indeed, on a fine 
evening such as this is, Lustofi thinks 1 should never be away from 
here.” , 

“How lovely it is!” Gilbert exclaimed again, turning, as he 
reached the house, to look back across the garden. 

The shadows were deepening now, the mists thickening in the 
valley below, and a long stretch of soft pastoral scenery opened away 
toward the west, where the Pic _de Bigorre,^ a dewy rose-tint now in 
the evening lights, stood up against the horizon of the sky. 

“ Come in,” said Madame Zophee, but softly, hesitatingly, from 
the window behind him. “ Come in, will you not, since you have 
come so fai’?” And he crossed the threshold, bent under the cuitaiu 
of delicate lace- work that hung in low festoons above his head, and 
entered her room. Again he exclaimed in tones of surprise, of be- 
wilderment, and of admiration. 

It was certainly not a commonplace room — low-ceilinged, and 
furnished with comfort, with simplicity, and with elegance. Full 
of causeuses and fauteuils such as a lady always, a man never, 
chooses for their respective use. Beautiful tazzas of jasper, lapis 
lazuli and malachite stood in different alcoves and recesses, filled m 
luxuriant quantity with roses and large virgin lilies that were already 
fading from the great heat of the day. Curious, unfamiliar-looking 
ornaments, in gold and silver carving, in amber and delicate-huea ' 
marble, vrere sti’ewed abundantly over every table and chiffonier; 
glistening vases of exquisitely tinted glass covered the mantel-shelf 
and filled one small hanging cabinet, while several others displayed 
treasures of china of curious and various kinds. 

Right round the room ran a low ebony bookcase quite filled with 
books all bound in the sweet-scented leathers of Russia, and mostly 
named in the cabalistic characters of tlie Russian type. A thick 
Turkish rug made a resting-place near the fire for Lustofi;, now the 
dew fell and the grass grew chilly without. A small piano, made of 
ebonv inlaid with silver, and with a curious monogram worked into 
the wood stood open in one corner ; pieces of music were strewed 
carelessly over it, and a broad sun-hat was left lying on the top. 

All this he seemed to take in, in one rapid glance, with several 
other details that struck him still more curiously. One of these was 
a picture hung high up in the west corner of the room facing east- 
wSd It was a pOTtrait, evidently, of a sacred character, for a glory 
encircled the bending head, and on a golden bracket just below there 
burned a soft glo^^^ng light. A small round table stood by a low 
chair near the wood fire, and on this was arrmiged what appeared 
preparations for a curious and solitary repast A shining salver bore 
a small fizzing urn of antique shape in gold and silver i;epousse 
Tvork- two tiny vases of opaque glass stood on either side, filled, one 
Avith big lumps of sugar, the other with slices of lemon daintily cut 
and arranged; one tall, slim crystal tumbler stood in front of the 


THE SUN'-MAID. 


74 

um, and a plate of tliin wafer-biscuits completed what appeared to 
him indeed most uncommon fare. 

The very pretty and artistic arian^^ement of one part of the room 
remained still to attract him. Close to the window by which they 
had entered, standing half across the lattice and half drawn back 
from it, was a green wire folding-screen with festoons of flowers and 
leaves trsining all over it, which sprung from a narrow earth-trough 
that ran round the edge. This inclosed a room within the room — a 
little jrainting studio. There was an easel, surrounded by all the artistic 
confusion of colors and palette and brush, and on this rested an un- 
finished picture, which at length, as he glanced round the room and 
its various curiosities and characteristics, fixed his attention and un- 
sealed his lips. IMadame Zophee had been engaged in disentangling 
her roses during the moment that she had left him to gaze undis- 
turbed, and she had been merely murmuring on to him her delight 
in their beauty, and her thanks to him for having gathered them; but 
now she turned round again as he sprung toward the easel, and ex- 
claimed, in his quick, impulsive way : 

“ Oh, Madame Zophee, how loveijM Did you paint this? Why, 
how wonderful you are! Do you paint? and do you play? Do you 
do everything?” 

” 1 do very little of anything,” she answered, “ except think and 
dream of doing a great deal.” 

” But you painted this?” 

“ Yes,” she said quietly, coming up to him as he stood before her 
picture, and looking at it from a little behiud him with half-closed 
eyes in a meditative, critical way, as if to test its points with his 
assistance in a new light. 

” But it is wonderful! it is beautiful!” he went on. “ What is it, 
jMadame Zophee? 1 have never seen any scene like tiiat — how could 
you do it? IV hat have you taken it from?” 

“ 1 have seen it,” she said. “ It is not a creation, only a memory. 
But I daresay it is scarcely a scene you are likelv to have come upon 
in your native land. It belongs peculiarly to niine. ” 

‘‘It is Homan Catholic,” he continued, vaguely, “ is it not? 
These are priests, monks, or something of that sort, surely?” 

” It is the atelier,” she answered, “ of the Monastery of Troitsa, 
where I went once with my guardian years ago, and which has stayed 
ever since in my memory and my imagination as a dream of the 
Middle Ages.” 

” It is like something 1 have read in some old book,” said Gilbert, 
dreamily, ‘‘ in the big library at home. I wish 1 could understand it! 
Will you explain it to me?” 

“ Well, you know, it is the workshop, as you would say, the 
atelier, just as 1 saw it; and they are all busy, the holy, solitary 
men, each at his different art, each at his separate easel. I remem- 
ber how they sat there, just like that, in their monastic robes, all 
grave and silent, with that broad sheet of sunlight streaming 
through the window upon their close-shaven heads ; and 1 though^ 
when I saw them, of Fra Angelico illuminating his precious manu- 
script in the quaint old times, and so 1 never forgot them in all these 
yeps. One was painting, like this old monk here, in deep, glowing 
colors such as these, grouping delicately drawn figures on a back- 


THE SUN-MAID. 


ground such as 1 have copied, of golden scroll-work, like fine cha 
ing upon metal, only more intricate still. Then on this side,” si 
went on, warming with the enthusiasm of the artist, as she e 2 
plained her work, ‘ ‘ see, they are worthing on the silver settings c 
the Eikons. That pale monk is hammering out a plate of metal 
embossing it on a pattern of wood; that one with the delicate feat- 
ures and the eager look on his face is engraving the glory rays; that 
one is sinking gems in a riza; this one is gilding a frame; and, look, 
this monk, quite by himself, is repairing jewelry. 1 have copied 
that bit of green enaihel wrought into arabesques on the stand there 
beside him from an old piece I have upstairs; and that is the Greek 
cross of the Archimandrite he is holding in his hand. See, it ough" 
to glitter with sapphires and rosy beads. These are sacramentsi 
cups embossed and gemmed with rubies, and the rest are relics and 
crosses and jeweled caskets, all brought for him to repair. 1 am so 
glad you like my picture. 1 have been working at it and dreaming 
over it for a long time now. ’ ’ 

” 1 think it is perfectly wonderful!” 

“It is only water-color, you see; but 1 tried to finish it highly, 
and I think I have succeeded just a little, though only very little, I 
fear. ’ ’ 

” And that is your church?” he said, thoughtfully. 

” Yes,” she answered, in her quiet, low, steady tones, ” that is 
my church.” 

He sighed, a short, quick sigh, wherefore he knew not, except that 
the picture impressed him, and his tiioughts went rambling about 
for a moment in a tangled sort of manner, seeming to reach 
home and return again before he spoke. Then rousing himself, to 
throw off some effect of these reflections that seemed to have fallen 
over them both, he said: 

“You do paint beautifully; and T suppose you have quantities 
and quantities of others. Ah! I see— here is a great portfolio full,” 
he continued, delighted, as he observed one leaning upon a sloping 
stand. ” Oh, may 1 open it? may 1 look at them? Do let me, Ma- 
dame Zophee, please.” 

“How absurd you are!” she said, laughing at his eagerness. 
” No, certainly not; not this evening, at all events. Another time, 
perhaps, you know? the marquise may bring you here again, and 1 
will show them to you. You are indeed a sympathetic spectator, 
but now, no, certainly not now. Have you forgotten your cousin’s, 
horse?” she added, reproachfully. 

“Oh, she is all right,” he answered, glancing toward the gate 
where Dinah’s nose appeared peaceably resting on the upper rail. 

” But my roses are not ‘ all riglit,’ and 1 must arrange them. But 
first, as you are here, Sir Gilbert (where you were never, by-the- 
way, invited to be), I must not neglect all the ceremonies of hospi- 
tality as we hold them in Russia. You must eat of my salt and 
drink of my chai.” 

She turned as she spoke, and took a little silver embossed box 
from the table, and, opening it, held it out to him and bid him par- 
take. U was filled with fine salt, of which she took a pinch betweert. 
her fingers and made him do the same, then — with a wafer, which 
was of plain flour, and therefore equivalent to bread, as she said — ■ 


THE SUX-MAID. ■ 


) 

e made him eat it, standing opposite to her, while she welcomed 
ni in words of melodious Russian, and bid him softly to “ come 
id go in peace. ” Then, as the ceremony was finished, she laughed 
nd turned to her fizzing tea-urn, and sat down by the table on her 
:>w chair. 

Have you ever drank Russian chai?” she asked him. 

“ Do you mean tea?” he replied. ” Do you drink it in tumblers, 
ind make it in the urn? How funny? Do you not have a tea-pot? 
I have been all this time expecting to see it come in.” 

” This is not an urn,” she said, indignantly. “ It is a samovar, 
nd all arranged inside for the tea-making. But it is not tea accord- 
bg to your barbarous ideas of the beverage. You must call it chai, 
Gilbert, and if you will ring that bell for another glass, you shall 
^ drink it in the proper manner, without cream, but with a slice of 
lemon instead.” 

The bell was not answered, as he expected, by Vasilie, whom he 
was anxious to inspect again in his odd-looking kaftan and shirt, 
- but by a tall woman, whose dress and general appearance, however, 
amazed him far more even than Vasilie had done. She was a fine- 
. looking woman, with a pleasant expression, clear complexion, blue 
eyes, and lint-light hair, and her dress was extremely picturesque. 
V 'file snow-white chemisette and bodice and short, crimson skirts 
' recalled some of the Italian peasant costumes, but the head-dress was 
P quite peculiar. It was national, and, to those who could recognize 
it, announced her position in the house. It was a loose cap of rich 
^ crimson satin, with a lofty diadem of the same material, delicately 
1 em])roidered in silver, and worn high upon her forehead. 

“What a magnificent personage!” exclaimed Gilbert, when Ma- 
dame Zophee had given her order, and, with a murmured answer of 
“ Sluches,” the woman had retired. 

“ Is she not? My faithful ISIarfousha! she is such an excellent 
soul. She is my nurse, or was, rather, in my juvenile days. She 
' has been with me since I was five years old, and will remain with 
me, I trust, till one or other of us die.” 

“ Yonr nurse — fancy! And is that the correct costume of the pro- 
fession?” 

\ “ Y'es, exactly so; and she never likes to give it up. 1 imagine she 

feels she would sink to the level of an ordinary doim^stic if she 
^dropped her diadem, and would lose her right, perhaps, to call me 
the ‘ douschinka,’ as 1 often overhear her do at present to Vasilie or 
. Ivan in the garden.” 
i ■ “ Vasilie? that is 3 wr man-servant?” 

. “ Yes, the bi^ j’el low-haired fellow you saw at St. Hilaire in the 
hall. A most worthy person, also, is Vasilie: his name in your 
tongue is William.” 

“ He wears a wonderful costume, loo, does he not?” 

“ Yes, we are all very national together. They seem to prefer 
wearing the dresses they have always worn, and 1 do not see why 
they should not be indulged.” 

“ How did j-ou get them all to naturalize here?” he asked. “ I 
mean for all these years. Do not they ever want to go back to Rus- 
sia, to their country and their home?” 

“ 1 have become a sort of moveable patrie to them, poor things,” 


THE SUN-MAID. 


77 


she said, smiling a little sadly. “ They are very good; they would 
never leave me. They came here when I came, you know; and as 
1 have never gone back again, why, they have stayed. They are 
free to go if they like, however. They were once my serfs; but long 
ago, even before ’65, 1 had set them free.” 

” There are no serfs in Russia now, are there?” 

“ No, thanks to our Alexander, the great and good, ‘ Svobodnaya 
Rossia,’ our Free Russia, has at last sprung into life. And such a 
life it is, too!” she added, smiling with enthusiasm; “ it already 
goes far to assure us that the freedom of the Russian serf has been 
the greatest historic deed of our age in any country whatever.” . 
“You must tell me much more about it all,” said Gilbert, eagerK 
“Ah! do not set toe off on these kind of topics, or you will be 
tired long before 1 am, I can assure you. There is so much to think 
about it, so much to know.” 

“ And 1 know next to nothing, ” said he, solemnly. 

“ Ah, 1 should like to tell you— but no,” she continued, decided- 
ly; “ we must not wander into that sort of talk; it is too interesting, 
it would last too long; and do you mean ever to remember— what do 
you call her? poor ‘ Deena’— your cousin’s horse? See, Marfa has 
brought your glass, and now, before you go, you shall have some 

^^T^fien from the fizzing samovar Madame Zophee poured the clear 
golden liquid that (sweetened and flavored with the citron juice and 
peel), was, indeed, much more like a delicate and exnilaiating liqimur 
than’anything conveyed to the western minds by the word tea. Gil- 
bert thought it delicious, and sat drinking it in a frame of mind 
strangely in harmony with circumstances as the}* surrounded him. 
It was ver}^ pleasant indeed. 

“ What a quantity of pretty books you have! he said, presently, 
glancing round the room again, as if to fix every one of its curious 

details in his mind. c- 

“ Yes, 1 am very dependent upon my library. You see, bir Gil- 
bert, 1 have a great deal of time on my hands. ” ^ ^ 

“ But they are all Greek— worse than that to me, he said. it 
they were Greek, I might make something out of them, but I cannot 

even read their names. ” „ i 

He turned to the low case that lined the wall quite near him, and 
pointed to the row of brown volumes on the level with his eye. 

.. “ Ah’ these are my poets— Lermontof, Pushkin, Derzhavin, Lom- 
onsof ”’she went on, touching book after book, in succession as she 
said tiieir names. “ Why is it you do not know about them in Eng- 
land? We read your poets.” „ , 

“ Yes indeed’ Why do we not? Y"ou may well ask; it seems tO 
me we know very little in England outside of the circle of ourselves. 
Languages, for instance. Why is it you know ‘ all about us, Ma- 
dame Zophee, and can talk to me in my own tongue, and have got 
all that collection I see over there of English books? and I— 1 know 
nothing at all about Russian writings, and 1 do not think I am sin- 
gular in my ignorance either.” 11 4 . It J 

“Ah!” she answered, laughing, “you know we have all talked 
English in Russia ever since our Vladimir the Second rnarried the 
da vmir Danish Harold, and that is a good while ago; so 


78 / THE SUN-MAID. 

/' 

we are pretty well at home now in the language. Russians are sup- 
posed to speak every civilized speech, I imagine because their own is 
so difficult that no one will learn it. But do you know, Sir Gilbert, 
you must really go. Look, it is positivel}'’ becoming dark. Indeed, 
please 1 must say, ‘ Prastchite,’ ‘ farewell.” 

“ But the key! You have forgotten you were to show me my way 
home.” 

“ I had forgotten. 'Well, here it is. Come, we will go, then. 1 
will walk with you down the garden, and let you through the little 
jgate; come. Dear me, how the evenings are closing in upon us! 
jYe shall have winter immediately, and this year winter means a 

>some move of my household gods for me.” 

Movel Are j^ou going away?” he exclaimed, as they passed 
-At from the window into the garden again. 

" “ Only to Pau,” she answered, “ and quite against my will. But 
- my doctor has decreed it; this year 1 am to spend the winter in 
town. ’ ’ 

“ Ah, really! but will it not be pleasant?” 

“ I prefer my home here, and my garden, and my leafy trees, 
which are just "the very things from which he wishes to drive me. 
He says my house is too closely surrounded for the winter, too much 
under the hill, and, moreover, my sitting-room is too low upon the 
ground; so 1 am to be moved, and 1 do not like it at all. How 
quietly ‘ Deena ’ has stood, to be sure!” 

“Yes; she is as good as Morton thinks her, which is a rare thing 
to be able to say o^f a man and his horse,” said Gilbert, as they 
pushed the gate open together. He glanced back into the garden 
with a lingering look as he untied Dinah’s rein. 

” Is not Yasilie,” he added, suddenly, pointing across the 
rose-bushes to a corner some distance away ; and Madame Zophee 
turned also. 

” Yes, that is Vasilie; he is going to water the flowers.” 

They watched for a moment as the man moved solemnly, among 
the gay borders, and stood pouring from his green can a shower upon 
the drooping roses and on the scarlet hydrangea heads. A 
picturesque-looking figure he was, in the deepening shadows of the 
gaixlen, attired in his strange costume. He wore tall boots, and his 
loose shirt hung outside his pantaloons; he had no hat on, and his 
big flaxen head looked tangled and shaggy as a lion’s mane. 

“ In his beloved peasant costume,” said Madame Zophee. ' “'ke 
is a thorough ‘ moujik,’ is Vasilie, quite a type; he firmly believes 
in all the ‘ domovoy ’—the house spirits— and he will never call Pau 
(for which he has a great contempt as a city in comparison with Mos- 
cow and St. Petersburg) anything but the ‘ Gelinka,’ the little vil- 
lage. Come, Sir Gilbert, shall I ever succeed in sending’you home? 
Please tell IMadame la Marquise it was not my fault — either your 
coming or your staying, or any consequent anxiety she may have 
had at your non-appearance. It was not my fault. Do you know 
that she is to have a croquet-party to-morrow, and that I am coming 
up to see Bebe Beresford and the baron in combat with the dear 
marquis and little Jeanne?” 

” Of course, I quite forgot. And you are coming? ad! 


I 


THE SUN-MAID. ' 79 

Well, please say 1 have not bored you very much. 1 do not know 
when 1 have had such a pleasant afternoon. ’ ’ 

“ No,” she answered doubtfully; “ I do not think 1 have been 
bored. But here is your gate. Sir Gilbert; so good-evening, and pray 
be more careful of your way another time.” 

A moment more, and she had locked the gate again behind him, 
and was wandering back to the chalet by the little pathway, along 
which a tiny stream ran, fringed with sedge grass and green, feath- 
ery ferns. And he led his home up through the beech wood and the 
thick shrubbery below St. Hilaire, treading slowly over the leaf- 
strewn turf through the soft shadows of the autumn evening, much 
in the frame of mind in which the prince may have been who wan- 
dered into the Enchanted Palace of the White Cats, and si)ent an 
evening with that immortal princess of the dear old fairy-lands. 


CHAPTER IX. 

CROQUET ON THE COTEA.UX. 

On the coteaux of the Pyrenees in those days we were very fond 
of croquet. Baron Keff el, though not an adept, was an enthusiast, 
losing his temper as regularly as he lost his game. The old Marquis 
de St. Hilaire was both enthusiastic and expert. Bebe was the 
“ crack ” mallet of the club. Morton \vas a fair match for him. 
Jeanne had proved an apt pupil; and Mademoiselle Lucile, Jeanne’s 
elder sister, ran Bebe very close for the champion cup. 

These days are now past, we hear, and on the wide sunny plain of 
Bilhere ” the Ladies’ Golf-ground ” is the important feature of the 
age. The ” putter ” has expelled the mallet, the round earth- holes 
supersede the hoops, a princely hand dispenses prizes, and the neat 
little white balls go skimming over the turf, sent triumphantly in 
“ drives ” and ” puts ” by the same fair steady hand that used to 
croquet Bebe Beresford, as he phrased it, ‘‘out of all existence.” 
Still, surely, the Marquise de St. Hilaire gives her croquet teas. 

In that lovely garden — where sun and shade chase one another 
over grass and flowers, wdiere the view is heavenly and the air is 
sweet — it was Madame de St. Hilaire’s delight to gather her favorite 
coterie of an afternoon. And there, a few daj's after her dinner- 
party, she was seated under the broad shade of a sweet-scented tree, 
her feet perched carefully upon a velvet stool, a white shawl thrown 
lightly over her shoulders, a broad parasol shielding her unbonneted 
head and her dainty cap from the wind and air. Lu and Fanfan lay 
curled on a small rug beside her; and Gilbert, in a happy condition 
of doles far niente, was stretched on the grass at her feet, lounging 
as only an Englishman can lounge, with that curious power of vol- 
untary resignation to the perfect enjoyment of utter laziness which 
generally accompanies much real energy and strength. 

‘‘ Play croquet? No, not for all the world on a day like this, 
when it is so perfectly delicious to do nothing.” Such had been his 
answer to Morton’s appeal to his energies and to his aunt’s pretended 
scoldings, when he had thrown himself down beside her and lay gaz- 
ing on through the autumn leaves at that wonderful sky. 


80 


THE SUX-MAID. 


Bebe bad come over from Pau for the afternoon, and was fixinsr 
the hoops busily on tlie croquet-ground, while the marquis and 
Jeanne distributkl mallets, and 3Iorton and Lucile discussed the 
sides. A Monsieur de Challonier had fortunatel}’’ arrived a few min-* 
utes before, and accepted an invitation to the game with alacrity ; so 
the match of six could be made up, notwithstanding Gilbert’s dis- 
affection. They waited' only for the baron now. 

3Ieantime the select little tea-party of the marquise arrived— the 
comte and comtesse from Chateau de Beaulieu; Monsieur and 
JMadame de Veuil, to look after their two daughters, who had preced- 
ed them on foot by the short cut through the valley, having been 
fetched by Gilberc and Morton earlier in the afternoon. 

As the 'De Veuil carriage drove up to the croquet-ground, two 
• servants appeared carrying the tea-tray, which, with some clusters 
of beautiful fruit, some glasses of lemonade and cups of iced coffee, 
yvaA laid on a round rustic table beneath the shadow of the broad- 
leaved tree by the marquise’s side. It was just at one end of the 
CToquet-ground, this seat and table, erected in the shade especially 
Mot her. She could watch the game from here, and she did watch 
/it, always joining eagerly in the disputes that rose thick and fast as 
the match proceeded, and siding ever with her husband, who was ex- 
pert but speechless, against the baron, w’ho was voluble, but always 
in the wrong— a piece of conjugal partisanship which the baron re- 
sented most bitterly, but the marquise continued stanch. 

“ Ila! see there,” she would cry, “Monsieur le Baron, the in- 
justice that my poor Leon would suffer did I not defend him against 
your stratagems. Yes, he has indeed well croqueted your balk 
Ah, Dieu!” 

But the baron was late to-day, and they still waited for him ; so 
presently the marquise said, “ As you do not begin, Leon, had you 
not better come first and have your coffee and lea? See, it is here, 
and it will be all cold long before your horrid game is done.” 

“ A good suggestion,” said Morton. “ Come, let us fortify our- 
selves for combat by an invigoratinir cup. Gilbert, you lazy fellow ! ’ ’ 
he called out, “ if you will not pla}^ we shall at least utilize you to 
hand round some tea. ” 

“ With all the pleasure in life,” said Gilbert, dreamily. “ Does 
anybody want some? ^Mademoiselle Lucile, I beg your pardon, can 
I do anything for you?” 

He sat up as he spoke, and, raising his hat, tipped it over his eyes, 
and smiled as the whole party of antagonists strolled up the croquet- 
ground to the tea-table, and grouped themselves round the marquise 
under the spreading tree. 

Jeanne and Lucile looked fresh and pretty in soft Indian silk 
dresses and geranium-crimson ribbons, very becoming to their warm, 
bright coloring and big Spanish eyes. They wore broad-brimmed 
sun-hats set coquettishly on their pretty heads, the wide flaps turned 
up on one side with a bunch of wild flowers, and lined with 
geranium silk, matching exactly with the trimming of their 
dress. They both obeyed presently Hie suggestion of IMorton, 
that they should all imitate Gilbert and sit down on the grass. 
The Comtesse and Madame de Veuil were accommodated right 
and left of the marquise with chairs, and supplied with their favor- 


THE SUIs-HAlD. 


81 

le beverage of iced lemonade — what ^lonsieur de Veuil called 
‘' quelque chose de rafraichissante. ’ He sipped it complacently 
himself, and pressed it enthusiastically upon the ladies. The mar- 
quis was becoming very hot, even now before his game began, so he 
t^ok his wife’s solicitous advice, and sat down quietly upon a wio r 
ciiair, opened his coat-flaps very wide, fanned himself gently w.:.*! 
h;s straw hat, and sipped a cup of warm tea, “ a tisane, ’ as he called 
if, to prevent a chill. 

And thus they were all sitting — a complacent, picturesque party 
^enjoying alike the heat and the shadow, the soft sense of fatigue 
aid the pleasure of repose, and sipping respectively their tea, coffee, 
aid lemonade: all were perfectly satisfied with the state of matters 
—excepting Gilbert. He alone among them veiled a certain rest- 
lelsness beneath his pretended indolence and ease; he was vaguely 
cthscious that the party was still incomplete, that he wanted and 
lopked forward to something more, and that — neither a game of 
Clouet nor the coming of Baron Keffel. 

Uuite suddenly he sprung to his feet. He had been looking from 
uMer his low-tipped hat for some time away be 3 "ond the croquet- 
gDund down the slope that reached into the valley, toward the blue 
snloke curling from the chimne.ys of the Swiss house; and now he 
hal caught sight of some one— the princess, surely of the enchanted 
paace of the day before — coming slowly over the meadow at the 
fo(t of the hill and turning up the narrow pathway that led through 
th^ garden to Chateau St. hlilaire. 

I Ha!” he exclaimed to his aunt, ” there is Hadame Zophee com- 
ind up the hill ; but she is making straight for the house. Shall 1 
go|nd tell her we are all here?” 

‘Aly dear boy, do. Whj’- she would have to go all up the hill and 
do^ again, and in this heat, too. Catch her, there is a darling 
chill, if you can. Dear me I wish there was a way through that 
greai railing, Leon. We must have a wicket made- just there.” 

” Kot for me, thank you,” said Gilbert, laughing; and in another 
insta\t he had crossed the croquet-lawn, sprung lightly over the 
railirrs, plunged into the thick wood, and was running at top speed 
dowrithe precipitous bank, endangering, but just saving, his neck 
everylmoment in his rapid springs over tangled brushwood and 
long, inotty roots; he came in sight again, skimming over the turf 
toward the garden-road where Madame Zophee was slowly winding 
her w^ through the sunlit meadows long l)efore 31onsieur de Veuil 
had shit that expressive mouth of his, which had sprung wide open 
in his airprise. 

” 31a Dieu! 3Vhat energy have those English!” 

” Ahlha!” said the old comte. “ They do make well the jump.” 

” Yesr said the marquise, proudly, “ there is not much real lazi- 
ness abolt him. ” 

A fewlninutes more and with flushed cheeks and hat in hand, Gil- 
bert wasfback again, walking slowly through the flower-garden 
along the'errace by 31adame Zophee’s side. He brought her up 
to the crcLuet-ground, and stood fanning himself violently, and 
pushing bick his tumbled hair during the little bustle of her recep- 
tion, and Uen he found her a shady corner a little back from the 
-marquise ad the tea-table; and, having carried her some iced coflee. 


THE SUN-MAID. 


82 

and refreshed himself, at IMonsieur de Yeuil’s entreaty, with sone 
cool lemonade, he threw himself down ap;ain on the grass in her near 
vicinity, feeling somehow this time that, for the moment, there vas 
nothing left in life to be desired. 

“ Dieu! what a domes-tick scene!” This was the next remark tiat 
broke upon his repose, uttered in snappish and sardonic tones that in- 
duced everybody to start and turn round, with the certainty of see- 
ing Baron ivefiel. And there he was, standing at the corner of :he 
lawn, pausing to inspect the party, with an admiration of which he 
himself was full worthy a share, being resplendent this afternoon in 
a rural costume. He wore white pantaloons, broad straw-hat, oat 
of a huge gray check — in fact, Scotch; and his own private weapm, 
ebony handled and ivory tipped, was flourished menacingly in 
one hand. Combat was for the moment forgotten, however, in 
l^oetic contemplation. 

‘ ‘ What a domes-tick spectacle ! It touches me, dear marqiise, 
to the very depth of my heart. ’ ’ 

“ Or it would, if heart and depths were not alike a mythical exist- 
ence,” she answered. “ Come here, you cynical old bachelor, ind 
tell us if you are in good humor and will have a cup of tea.” 

“Ah!” he sighed, approaching her with his quick, uncerain 
footsteps, and bowing, hat dotted, almost to the ground, “ V^hat 
do we not owe to the charming queen of our society, Madane la 
Marquise de St. Hilaire, who introduces into our circles of soliude 
and barbarity the delightful customs of England’s family life?^ 

“ Bah, nonsense!” began the marquise. 

“ How touching!” continued the baron, patheticall}\ “The 
good papa ” — indicating the marquis, who acknowledged theiom- 
pliment instantly with a bland bow; “the beautiful mother who 
presides at the festive board,” he went on, waving a hand t) the 
marquise, who. however, only responded with that snappish, ‘ AYill 
you hold?” “ And then the branch, Morton, and the cha’ming 
fiancee—” 

“You are more insufferably ridiculous than usual,” inteu'upted 
the marquise at this point; “keeping eveiy body waiting, oo, for 
the croquet-match (he whole afternoon. Will you sit down, I say? 
Will you have your tea? or shall 1 send the tray away am make 
you play without it?” 

“Heaven forbid!” he exclaimed, with very real alarm for he 
saw a servant approaching across the garden at that monent, and 
he knew madame to be capable of revenge. “ I will be god, then: 

1 will take this seat beside you, and be docile and obedent and 
grateful. Ah, wdiat a cup of tea! Madame, your fair nand has 
lent the subtle charm: it is exquisite. Ah, cielf this is ‘ d'leeciousl’ 

1 do call it ‘ deleecious!’ ” And, like a bristling old tomcit soothed 
for a moment into a state of purr, he spread his silk haidkerchief 
over his duck pantaloons, sighed complacently, and sippd his tea. 

“ Madame Zophee,” he said, presently, “ when am I h have that 
promised enjoyment of a glass of golden caravan from you? Ah, 
that brittle thing— a woman’s promise! broken ever, ever made 
again. ’ ’ 

“ Ko, no, not broken — only delayed,” said Madame ophee. 


THE SUN-MAID. 


83 


'* Chai,” he went on, meditatively; “ the golden chai, that is the 
bulwark of domestic life in Russia, Madame la Marquise.” 

“ Containing,” put in Bebe, “ perhaps a little more acidity even 
than we infuse into our domestic concoctions, nde the lemon- juice.” 

‘"Bebe, Bebe!” cried the marquise and Morton, simultaneously; 
“ what an execrable effort at a pun!” 

‘IGood for me,” said Bebe, philosophically. “Do you know, 
baron, how ice really make the beverage at the domestic hearth?” 

“ What? no, no! 1 cannot ever make it at all,” said the baron, 
eager for immediate information; and then Bebe sung: 

“ Lovely woman is the sugar, 

Spoons we poor men always be; 

Matrimony is hot water— 

So we make our cup of tea.” 


“ That is capital, capital, most capital!” roared the baron. 

But the marquise shook her head at both of them, and cried, “You 
naughty Bebe! 1 will not have you bringing your vulgar little fast 
songs here. 1 wish you were nearer; you wicked child, I should like 
to box your ears.” 

“ Ah, well,” continued the baron. “ 1 do not know, 1 am not all 
approval of the domestic life of Great Britain. 1, have, seen it also 
myself.” 

“ Ah, but— •” exclaimed Madame la Comtesse, bending toward 
her hostess— “ it is all that can be surely of what is most beautiful, 
the life of the family in your land?” 

“ My dear countess,” replied the marquise, “ believe me there is 
a deal of nonsense talked upon that as upon most other subjects on 
which people have preconceived prejudices and fixed ideas. English 
home-life is all very well— God forbid I should say a word to dis- 
parage it— but, believe me, I for one have found domestic bliss is 
not confined within the shores of Britain, and that no happiness of 
family life can exceed that to be found in many parts of France, my 
dear madame, and most especially in thecoteaux of the Pyrenees.” 

“ Brava!” cried the baron, “ brava!” And as for the marquis at 
this juncture, he found it necessary to express his feelings by la 3 dng 
down his cup, hat, and handkerchief, and stepping gallantly over 
to clasp and kiss tenderly his wife’s hand. AYith profound courtesy 
he bent before her as he murmured, “ Thank you— thank you in- 
finitely, my Violet — mj^ love.” 

“ Well,” said the baron, presently, having had all the ref reshment 
desirable for him by this time, and feeling ready for a return to his 
chronic condition of general combat— “ well, as the marquise gives 
the lead to me, 1 will say the truth. For the English domestic ex- 
istence 1 would not give that— Puff !” And he snapped his fingers, 
shrugged his shoulders, and pursed out his lips with indescribable 

expression. . . * -n . 

“ Ha come' 1 will not allow that!” cried the marquise. Baron! 
baron! ’ Order, order! iMy turn!” For the baron went on per- 
sistently; , . „ C 1 . -u'-X 

“ No, not that, 1 sav, not a straw. It is all Sunday rost-biff 

and Christmas plum-pudding: but no, not for me, it has no ‘ dis- 
traction.’ ], Will, tell, you. 1 went once to England— three times, 


THE SUX-MAID. 


84 

you know, I went indeed altogether — but once for this alone, to 
study the chateau life, the great domestic home of England. I Lad 
a friend; I knew him in Vienna. He marry, has two sons and a 
daughter, make a home, and became a family man, and I went to 
see him. Well! all was charming— dinner charming, evening 
charming. Handsome wife, everjdhing delightful, so 1 think at 
first. But in two or three days 1 see my friend was altered. What 
was he? 1 cannot say. Dull, stupid, troubled, and his wife so often 
also. There \vas coals, and servants, and cooking, ” he continued, 
checking off the national and domestic trials on his fingers; “and 
there was company to come, or not coming, or something. Oh, so 
much I I begin to see that even with a great deal of money it was 
a most difficult thing to live the domestic life of Britain at all. It 
was indeed a most intricate art. He was dull, my friend, cross — ” 

“ Bored, 1 dare say,” suggested Bebe. 

“ Well, yes; bored — so you call it— and so did he. 1 say to him, 

‘ My friend,’ 1 say, ‘ you go and distract yourself,’ and he replied, 
‘ Good God, 1 am distracted enough already.’ iSo I answer, ‘Oh, 
no. Take madame — she is charming— go to town, to London, 
saunter a little, look in the shops, smoke a cigar on the boulevards 
or in the cafes, go in the opera, buy a new dress for madame, and 
you will come home refreshed— perfectly distracted. ’ x\ud be re- 
plied, finally, ‘ Perfectly distracted, I dare say. 1 should certainly 
come home most infernally bored.’ So 1 say good-by, and I come 
back, and I write that month in the Revieio of the Strange Planners, 
in Berlin — 1 write that the life of the castle in Great Britain is a very 
perplexing thing.” 

Beview of the Strange Manners,” exclaimed Bebe, “ of which 
you wrote, baron, doubtless some strange things!” 

“ 1 told them,” said the baron, stoutly, “ 1 liked three things in 
England much— i'ccrry much. ’ ’ 

“ And they were?” said Bebe. 

“ The Tower of London, Oxford City, and — the fat oxes of Lord 
Valsingham,” replied the baron, conclusively, rising as he spoke, in 
emphatic evidence that the occasion was ended, and the argument 
conducted to a theory and a final point. 

“ After that,” said the marquise, with a sweetly ironical smile, as 
if for the moment he was utterly beneath answer or opposition of 
any kind — “ after that, icill you go and play your game of croquet? 
a little minor accomplishment of which at least you owe, Monsieur 
le Baron, your scientific knowledge and superior skill to your pro- 
longed and successful visits to my country.” 

“ IMadame la Marquise is always charming, always amiable, al- 
ways complimentary,” said the baron, smiling in bland acknowledg- 
ment of her fiattery^ ■which he appropriated in earnest, and with 
great satisfaction to himself. 

Then he shouldered his mallet, and broke ruthlessly into the 
different little duets which had all this time been murmured in 
pleasant undertones by the idle croquet-players in various corners 
beneath the shady tree. One and all they were roused now by him 
and marshaled, and were soon in high combat upon the field. 

Not by any means the least pleasant of these duets had been that 
one carried on very sotto voce between I^Iadame Zophee and Gilbert, 


THE SUH-MAID. 


85 


in a continuous running translation, for his benefit, on her part, of 
the generally eccentric language of all the past conversation, which 
had indeed rambled about backward and forward in a curious man- 
ner, calculated to suit the understandings of all parties, from broken 
English into voluble French. Now the croquet-match was fairly 
started, the marquise joined in this Ute-d-tete, while JMonsieur de 
Veuil devoted himself to preparing afresh glass of lemonade for the 
comtesse, and the old comte escorted Madame de Veuil on a short 
and stately promenade round the precincts of the flower-garden. 

As the ahernoon advanced, and the feeling of the approaching 
sunset came creeping on, and the light began to glow and deepen 
over the glorious-, landscape, and the shadows to stretch broadly 
across the lawn, it was, as Baron Keif el loved to say, “ deleecious " 
to sit under that spreading tree and toss the conversation-ball here 
and there in occasional and desultory remarks ; to let the eyes wan- 
der idly over the changing view across valley and mountain ; or to 
watch, for variety, with many a burst of laughter and ringing mer- 
riment, the party of antagonists on the croquet ground, who were 
all worked up into various stages of violent excitement long before 
anybody had reached the middle hoop. 

Gilbert declared that croquet was a decided mistake, except, as in 
the present instance, as a spectacle for the amusement of your in- 
active friends. In this light he very much enjoyed it, lying com- 
fortably upon the shady grass, with one hand supporting his head, 
and the other occupied in picking industriously every daisy within 
his reach, and throwing it, for his own edification and much to her 
annoyance, with very dexterous aim straight at Fanfan’s nose, wak- 
ing up that somniferous little person each time with a jump and a 
vicious bark which caused his aunt much excitement and agitation. 
He listened, in a dreamy, very pleasant frame of mind the while, to 
the conversation that rippled on between Madame Zophee and the 
marquis, interrupting it only now and then as he broke into a laugh 
or exclamation over the croquet-match. 

The venomous expression of the baron’s face was very irresistible, 
as he took one of his wary though unsuccessful aims at an enemy’s 
ball, sending his own driving over the ground with a vicious energy 
of purpose deserving of a better result. His stamp of fury as the 
ball glided rapidly forward quite six or eight inches wide of its 
point, was delightful, and Bebe’s triumphant war-dance over each 
of these achievements did not tend to tranquilize his nerves. As the 
game went on, indeed, the splenetic and explosive condition at 
which the baron arrived was something terrible. 

“ I cannot think it is good for him,” said Monsieur de Veuil, sol- 
emnly, at one point at which the baron’s agitation had quite exceed- 
ed all rational bounds. “ It is not good, it is dangerous, to agitate 
so much the mind, with such a weather too. Madame la Marquise, 
! with me. Entreat him, I do beg of you, to tranquilize 



“Bah’ Allez!” responded the marquise. “ There is no fear; be 
tranquil. Monsieur de Veuil. He adores the emotions, 1 tell you he 
does. He loves to excite himself! And how would he do so, 1 ask 
you in his life, without a family or any cares, unless he had now 
and then the innocent indulgence of a little rage at croquet? He 


THE SUis’-MAID. 


86 

would not know otherwise any of the great passions or excitements 
of this life. Leave him : he is perfectly happy : that last explosion 
at Bebe has done him good, he is much better now. Ah, my good 
Leon, that was a noble stroke!” 

There was truly much pride and triumph in her heart as she 
watched the marquis play, for lie sent his spinning ball with a care- 
ful dexterity that carried" it surely to its mark ; and as he poised his 
huge, soft figure, and took his slow steady aim, the baron’s out- 
break of impatience was always drowned in the ” Brava! brava!” of 
the marquise and the eager applause of her fair hands. 

!So the afternoon waned onward, and the shadows lengthened, and^ 
the subtle chill of the sunset began to creep into the air, and Madame 
Zophee drew her shawl suddenly close round her shoulders and said 
she must be going home: but the combat still waxed hot and violent 
upon the croquet field. 

“ 1 must see the game out, my dear,” said the marquise, wrap- 
ping herself up in her soft vicuna. ” it is one of the chief pleasures 
1 have in life, you know, seeing my Leon put the baron to the 
fiight. Is that Madame de Yeuil’s carriage? You must wait a mo- 
ment, my dear madame, for your two charming girls. And is the 
comtesse going? Well, a thousand times au revoir, my dear friend. 

I will not ask you to pause an instant; the evening is certainly be- 
coming chill. And Zophee, must you, too, leave me? Mell, 
Gilbert shall open the gate for you below the garden, and so you 
will reach your own little nest through your postern-door, dearest, 
by the quickest way.” 

Madame Zophee had no time to answer just then, or even to say 
her adieus, for suddenly Bebe called out, ^is he saw the part}^ round 
the tea-table was beginning to move, ” Is everybody going? Stop a 
minute! Madame la Marquise, 1 beg your pardon — did 1 interrupt 
you? Monsieur le Baron, 1 see your gesticulations. Is it my turn? 
Ah, well, 1 will not keep you waiting a: moment, but 1 have two 
very pleasant bits of information which 1 must not forget to impart. ” 

“Ah?” “So?” “ AVhat?” “ How?” according to the usages 
of their respective languages, broke from each listener, as Bebe 
paused triumphant to enjoy the eagerness of his audience for an in- 
■tant, until his own impatience to give information prevailed, and 
he exclaimed, “ Have you heard that the first meet of the winter is 
fixed for this day fortnight, and that Graham, the M.F.H., has re- 
turned? and that, moreover, beyond this delightful piece of news, 
there is another? The season is to be opened in due form at tho- 
Gassion on the Thursday following by a bachelors ball.” 

“ ISFo; is that really true?” cried Morton. “ That is famous. ” 

“Yes, quite true. A lot of us fellows settled it at the club last 
night. ]Not the big B. Ball, of course; you know that piust come 
oft, as usual, at Mid-Lent— at Mi-Careme; but this is to be a little 
throw-off, just to set things going.” 

“ Ah! on purpose, 1 fancy,” skid Iftorton, with a side-glance and 
a smile toward Jeanne, “ to catch me for the last time on the acting 
committee. Hurra! once more. Then away goes my rosette. I’ll 
hand it on to the next comer for good. ’ ’ 

“ Then, are people arriving already?” asked the marquise. 

“ Lots of them!” cried Bebe. “ A new turn-out of young ladies 


THE SUH-MAID. 


87 


show up on the boulevard every day, and the club list is fast filling. 
It is going to be a capital season, madame. Ah, I hear you, baron ; 
I see — do not agitate yourself, 1 entreat of you; 1 am coming. 
There! that was a comfortable little corner you had got into, but I 
think 1 have croqueted your ball.” 

“ And now 1 must really go,” said Madame Zophee, rising. 
“ Dear marquise, adieu,” 

” Cherie, are you positively off? Then Gilbert shall go and open 
the gate.” 

“ 1 will walk home with Madame Zophee, with her permission,” 
said Gilbert, who had sprung up instantly when she spoke of leav- 
ing. 

” No, no; please stay comfortably where you are; do not let me 
disturb you. 1 can open the gate easily, and 1 think I know my 
way.” 

” But, please, 1 want to go,” said Gilbert, eagerly, in that down- 
right, simple, and very matter-of-fact way of his. 

” But 1 do not require you. Really, do sit down again. Dear 
marquise, farewell. ’ ’ 

” But, Madame Zopliee, stay one moment,” he urged, “You 
don’t forbid me— not in real earnest? May 1 not escort you?” 

“ 1 had much rather you did not. I dislike particularly disturb- 
ing people on my account, so you had much better stay and finish 
your cigar.” 

He flung the cigar away as she answered him, and stood opposite 
her a moment, looking his appeal for her permission as she half hesi- 
tated and paused. “You do noi forbid me?” 

“ 1 think I do. Yes, 1 am rigorously exclusive in the defense of 
my rights, and beyond that door through which I let you pass yes- 
terday 1 like to preserve my solitary and despotic reign.” 

“ Beyond the door, yes, I dare say!” he exclaimed, triumphantly. 
“ There you may assert your rights; but 1 beg to state that your 
tyranny is limited in its range of exercise, Madame Zophee, and on 
this side that particular barrier 1 deny your power. You cannot for- 
bid me walking through the grounds of St. Hilaire and across my 
aunt’s flower-garden, however unpleasant you majr choose to be 
when we reach the boundaries of your especial kingdom in our 
promenada” 

“ No more 1 can,” she answered, laughing.^ “ Well, just to that 
point 1 suppose 1 must submit; on one condition, remember. Sir Gil- 
bert — that you promise to respect my right of way in your tours 
through the country on horseback in future. Come, then. I must 
really go.” 


CHAPTER X. 

H E R P O II T F 0 L I O. 

Sir Gilbert and Madame Zophee went off together across the 
flower-garden, he walking by her side, talking and laughing still 
with that ease of manner and gayety of spirit which she found so 
pleasant. Pulling a rose here and there to give to her, and rattling 
on about Bebe and the baron and the croquet match all the way 


88 


THE SUX-MAID. 


down the slope and through the beechwood till they had reached the 
path along which he had Ted Dinah home through tlie twilight the 
night before— then they were in view of Madame Zophee’s gate. 
All the while there had remained in his voice and manner that ease 
and unconsciousness — apparently equally of himself and of her. 

It kept the conversation on the ground of most surface pleasantry, 
disarmed all her usual reserve, and made her feel at home and at 
ease with him; more at home, indeed, than she had allowed herself 
to feel with any one for many a day, even with a friend of her own 
sex, and far less with one of his. But from the very first he had 
somehow disarmed her, his boyish, sunny ways were so very pleas- 
ant to her; and it seemed almost foolish to be ever watching and 
warding off the advance of their acquaintance when there was really 
nothing in his manner save that eager, ready courtesy which seemed 
to spring alike for eveiybod}^ and certainly for every woman, old or 
young; nothing in his clear blue eyes, as they turned continually 
upon her, but kindliness and cordiality and a boyish satisfaction in 
her presence. He seemed so young to her, so much younger than 
her life-sobered self. Yet she started and said “ No ” directly, 
when he requested, as the wicket came in signt, that he might ac- 
company her still, just along that little pathway to her home. 

“ Do you not want me to pull a few more roses for you?” he said. 

” No, thank 3 'ou very much. There are so few left now 1 think 
1 shall let them live out their own little day.” 

” But there really were some beautiful clusters very high up yes- 
terday, which it just struck me, 1 remember, would be quite in full 
bloom to-day. It is really a pity not to gather them. ” 

Thank j'ou, no. I shall let them bloom unmolested where they 
are.” 

” Then I must speak my real wish,” he continued, eagerN, ” and 
lay aside all subterfuge and excuse. IVIay I go all the way home 
with 3 ’ou, and see your portfolios of drawings?” 

“ Now, Sir Gilbert, that was really a base subterfuge, trying to 
delude me into a belief in jour amiability and desire to be of use. 
And now this is also a mere excuse for the , idlest curiosity. You 
cannot really care for my drav/ings the least bit in the world.” 

“ But 1 do,” he answered. ” 1 have been thinking of those dear 
old monks ever since I saw them, and wondering over the odd 
dreaniy sort of life they must lead there among those pictures and 
beautiful old jewels; and you cannot imagine how new these ideas 
are to me, and how 1 wusli to see into some more of them.” 

‘‘ Do not tempt me!” she answered, almost wistfully. ” You do 
not know what it is to an artist to have a sympathetic spectator, 
such as you, at all events, pretend to be.” 

“And as I am,” he went on. “ Ton do not know% Madame 
Zophee, what it is to have lived the sort of life I have, and to wake 
up all of a sudden to find out that you are pretty neariy ignorant of 
almost ever 3 dhing 3 ’'ou want to know. ” 

“ But you are not ignorant. Sir Gilbert— as people go,” she w^as 
going to add, but she stopped the remark with instinctive tact at 
that point, and he finished it instead. 

“Not as fellows go, 1 dare sav, ’ he answered. “ 1 have been 
educated in an ordinary kind of way like my neighbors; but there is 


THE SUil-MAID. 


89 


a sort of realizing of things one does not get at home — tliere is no 
doubt of it; and a man has so little time for books and reading 
travels, or thinking anything about it all, once his school-days are 
over, what with hunting and shooting and all that, and the parish 
and magisterial matters besides. And so really, before I met you, 
and before I came here, I did not take in at all that there were other 
nations in the world besides us, and other countries with the same 
interests and full of histories of human life; only I had a vague idea 
that 1 disliked a foreigner. Is owl want all of a sudden to know all 
about it.” 

“ But I fear my portfolio of drawings will not teach you much.” 

“Yes; it will; il will help me to realize — that one picture of yours 
did — about other religions, you know, and the life people lead who 
believe differently from what we do, and the art, and the literature, 
and all the results that grow^ out of the difference. ’ ’ 

” If your mind travels as fast as that,” she answered, “ you will 
get very quickly over a great deal of ground. ’ ’ 

“ And that is just what it does do,” he w'ent on; “it travels very 
fast, and 1 go groping away often in the dark, quite satisfied, never 
seeing a thing for ages; and then, all of a sudden, it flashes upon 
me and lights up my wdiole mind in a new way, and then it takes 
hold upon it instantly firm and fast, and 1 never let it go again. 
That is my character, you see, Madame Zophee.” 

And so in the course of prolonged experience she found it to be. 

“But really — my portfolio of drawings — it is nonsense! they 
cannot be of any use to you. Here is the gate, and 1 really think 
you had better go back.” 

But as he pushed it open for her, somehow he passed through as 
well, and then he closed it behind him, and they were threading their 
way, still side by side, along the path by the stream toward the back 
entrance to the chalet before he had nearly finished his eager answer 
to her last remark. 

“ Yes; everything you say is of use to me, and makes me feel in- 
clined to go back to the school-room and begin over again to learn. 
1 cannot describe to you what a curious sort of pleasure it has sud- 
denly become to me to feel the powers of realizing the existence of 
other countries, and of sympathy with other nations coming sudden- 
ly into life. 1 feel, iMadame Zophee, as if 1 had lighted upon the 
spring of a wonderful, hidden, and far-winding stream, which I long 
intensely to follow through its course.” 

■ • That is simply that your latent national love of travel and ex- 
ploration and enterprise has been waked up. It has always been 
peculiar to your countrymen, you know. Why, the old stories of 
your Challoner and Anthony Jenkinsou, as far back as the days of 
our Ivan and your Elizabeth, fighting their way up the Dvina and 
down the Volga, to seek for Eastern treasures at Nijni and Astra- 
khan, were tlie favorite histories of my youngest reading days; and 
all over the world you are doing the same thing still.” 

“ Not all of us,” he said, impetuously. “ There is a sort of man 
who never goes abroad, and 1 was rapidly growing into one myself 
a few months ago. ’ ’ 

“ But now you never will,” she answered. “ The energy of travel 
is very large in you indeed. Sir Gilbert, and more than travel— of ex- 


90 


THE SUK-MAID. 


p] oration, and power of theorizin.^ from what you see. 1 suppose 
that always was the difference in your nation between man and man, 
as you have all gone rambling about the world. But, talking of the 
Volga, here we are at the back entrance to my kingdom. Will you 
come round this way and see my pets — my old Belgian friend, and 
my Pyrenean watchman, and my Russian horses? You know 1 call 
them Volga and Vazuza.” 

“What pretty names! But why? What do they mean? The 
Volga is a great river, is it not?” 

“ Yes; and Vazuza is a river also. It is one of the old peasant 
legends that the two challenged each other in a race once to see 
w^hich could first reach the Caspian Sea; and tW Vazuza staited 
first, at a rapid and impulsive pace, but grew soon exhausted, so that, 
by and by the Volga, coming along at a grand, steady even flow, 
overtook her, and poor little Vazuza, dreading to be left behind, cast 
herself on the mercy of her stronger sister, and prayed that she 
would bear her to the sea. Thus it was that their streams mingled, 
and they flow on together. And so I call one of my pets Vazuza, 
because she is so eager and impetuous, and the other the V olga, be- 
cause she is the elder and steadier of the two : the fiery young one 
could never achieye a lengthy journey without her. But you shall 
see them. Come in this way. ” 

They turned together off the winding path, went through a broad 
gate-way and across a yard behind the chalet to the neat little stable- 
door, where they came upon a large dun-colored dog, lying un- 
chained on a thick mat bydiis wooden kennel. 

“ Ah, here is my Dolle, sound asleep. Get up, you dear old hound, 
and show yourself. Look, Sir Gilbert, is he not a darling? Is he 
not worthy of his peaceful repose here? Poor old dog! he has done 
many a hard day’s work.” 

“ Is that the kind of hound they wwk in Belgium?” 

“ Yes, and in some parts of Russia, too. Did I tell you how 1 
found Dolle? 1 was traveling with my guardian and his daughter 
Zaida, and we stopped four weeks once in a big hotel in Belgium, by 
the seaside near Bruges, and my window looked over a court, 
where, day after day, I used to see them loading Dolle’s luggage-cart 
so high and with such heavy boxes, and his poor old legs "tottering 
under it all, hardly able to stand. And Zaida and 1 used to feed 
him till he got to know us, and he would drag his cart after us along 
the garden if they left him for one moment alone; and one day we 
persuaded my guardian, and he let us buy him for the price of a 
strong young dog; and so he traveled all the way to Russia with us, 
and then with me dowm here. Dear old Dolle! 1 fear he will not 
live very much longer,” 

The old dog rose as she called him, and made a feeble effort to 
wag his tail ; and Gilbert stood by admiring and deeply sympathiz- 
ing with her devotion to her old favorite, as she took his huge sleepy 
head betw'een her two little white hands, and kissed him tenderly 
between his blinking eyes. 

“ 1 see you really""are nearly as fond of your four-footed friends as 
lam.” 

“ No one could help loving this faithful old thing,” she answeied. 
“ Zingaro, the Pyrenean, keeps w^atch at the house-door; Dolle has 


THE SUN- MAID, 


91 


"been so long accustomed to the stables, he likes to be about here ; 
and Lustoff, 5 'ou know, never leaves me, wherever 1 am, either night 
or day. He lies on a big rug beside my bed while I am asleep, and 
his paw scraping the door is the first thing 1 hear of a morning as 
Marfa’s footsteps pass down-stairs, i^ow, will you push that door 
hard for me? Here we are at the stables. ” 

And in they went. The pretty pair of dark bays excited Gilbert’s 
admiration as much as Joe’s proudly exhibited stud at St. Hilaire 
had done, and he stood, half alarmed and half delighted, as Madame 
Zophee left his side to walk up close between her favorites, and 
smoothed Vazuza’s pretty, arching neck. 

“ Thisis Vazuza,” she said, “ this restless, fidgetmg young thing; 
and this steady old one is the Volga. Is she not beautiful and good?” 

“ They are very pretty,” said Gilbert; “ but ought you to go up 
so close to them, JMadame Zophee?” 

“ Oh, the}’’ know me so well; I come in often. They are only 
fidgeting because they want a lump of sugar, and think 1 must have 
one hidden somewhere. Volga is really very old. 1 used to ride 
her some years ago, before 1 came here, and she knows every tone 
in my voice. 1 feel her really a companion and friend. Is it not so, 
douschinka?” she continued, laying her cheek down, with a sad- 
dened expression, upon Volga’s neck. ” She is so accustomed 
to me in every sort of mood. She thinks she is responsible for the 
safe conduct of both Vazuza and me. Good-by, you pretty one! 
No, L have no bits of sugar to-night, not a scrap. Stand still; don’t 
fidget, Vazuza, till ] get past.” 

“ 1 declare, it looks fearfully dangerous. I am glad to see you 
safely out,” said Gilbert, as she slid her way from between the two 
pairs of stamping heels, and escaped laughingly from within reach 
•of Vazuza’s mouth, which opened in playful though alarming-look- 
ing efforts to catch her dress. 

“ They are so accustomed to me. It would not do for any one 
but me or Ivan to go up between them so; but they do not really 
mind either of us. ” ,, , 

“ I suppose they are Orloffs, are they not, like nearly all the Rus- 
sian horses one hears anything about?” 

“No; oddly enough, they are not. They come from my old 
'Country home — my guardian’s, you know, in \ ladimir; they were 
reared on the place. He has numbers of them, all with arched 
necks and long, bushy tails, like these two. He gave me Volga on 
a birthday once, and sent me Vazuza soon after I came here.” 

Dozens of questions sprung to Gilbert’s lips as she talked thus to 
him; and a ■wondering interest in herself and her belongings made 
him feel there was much, so much, he should like to ask and know ; 
but a recollection of Morton’s warning restrained hiiir, and he asked 
nothino-, only looked curiously round as she led him through the 
garden”to the other side of the house, and toward the open window' 
by which they had entered the evening before. By a sort of tacitly 
^established consent, they walked on together, and she said nothing 
more about his going back or not accompanying her, but talked to 
liim in a dreamy, spontaneous sort of way, as if she had quite for- 
gotten that his being there was anything beyond her ordinary custom 
and habit. 


92 


THE SUK-MAID. 


So they entered together, to find the fire burning low, and (he 
room dark and cheerless, the sun-glow having left it, and the 
shadows falling heavily across her pictures and in the corners where 
the tazzas stood. Madame Zopliee shivered, and said : 

“ Dear! how late 1 am, and how Marfa will scold me! And this 
room — how inhospitably dull and dark it seems!” 

“We can remedy that, surely, in a very few minutes,” said Gil- 
bert. “ May 1,” he added, hesitatingly, “ may 1 put on coals for 
you or poke the fire?” 

“ You would find either very difficult,” she replied, with a laugln. 
“ simply for the want of coals and pokers. But I dare say we can 
manage. Do let us make it burn up before Marfa comes in; then 
she won’t know how cold it has been. But I should not wonder, 
now, if you did not know how to make up a wood fire.” 

She knelt down on the rug as she spoke, and he answered, looking 
doubtfully on, “1 have made one in the woods many a time. 1 am 
sure I could help you;” and then he knelt down also on one knee, 
a little distance away from her, and watched while she laid big 
blocks of wood deftly across the shining brass dogs above the pile of 
white, smoldering ashes, in the midst of which, as she moved them 
gently, appeared a hot, crimson glow. Then she drew down the 
“ blower ” sharply for a fetv moments, and waited, looking round 
at him with a smile. 

“Well!” he said, “ what good will that do?” 

She shook her head. “ How impatient you are! Wait — there! do 
you not hear?” 

A roaring gust, as she spoke, seemed to rush up the chimney, and 
in another instant she threw up the iron covering again, and dis- 
closed a bright, blazing fire. The wood crackled, and the flames 
danced up and wrapped her in the warm reflection of their light. She 
knelt still for a few minutes, looking into the fire, her deep, dark 
eyes returning the glistening reflection, and the color on her cheek 
glowing with the soft luster of “ a light seen through alabaster ” — 
the glow of the eager inner life that with passionate fervor flushed 
and faded, and went and came. 

He was, delighted with the fire she had made for him, as it burned 
up and danced and crackled with a cheery, noisy blaze, and he 
remained still kneeling before it, rubbing hi^ hands, and looking 
about the room, recognizing it all again, while IMadame Zophee 
moved on to a low chair at one corner, and leaned back and threw 
her hat aside, as if tired out with the day’s exertions, and glad to be 
at rest. Her eyes, with that deep fire-glow in them, glistened with 
strange, unspoken feeling, as if her thoughts had become suddenly 
sad and absent while he still knelt there. 

He watched her furtively for an instant, then glanced cigain round 
the room. They were both silent until — 

“ 1 beg your pardon,” she said, suddenly. “ I am so accustomed 
to solitude, you know, my thoughts go wandering so easily aw^ay; 
and 1 am tired this evening. ” 

“And 1 beg 3murs,” he answered, rising instantly to his feet. 

“ 1 have inflicted myself persistently upon"" you, notwithstanding 
every possible remonstrance from j^our side. Never mind; forgive 
me, and 1 will take myself away.”" 


THE SUH-MAID. 


93 


“ ]So, it is not that. Stay,” she said; ” 1 did not mean to be rude 
to you; and, indeed; believe me, I think it very kind of you to care 
to come. Let me see — do not go — what was I to have shown you? 
Oh, yes: my drawings. Would you care to look at them, really? 
There they are: in that huge portfolio you will find all my collec- 
tion from several wandering years. ’ ’ 

Gilbert turned eagerly. May 1 look at them?” 

” Certainly, if you care to do so. Will you draw the stand here 
toward the fire? There is a better light just now in the evening 
from this window, aAvay from that screen of leaves. Now, sit there. 
Sir Gilbert— that is it — and turn them all over; and when you are 
curious about any of the subjects, apply to me.” 

It was like an unread book to him, this experience — quite new 
and intensely^ interesting; it was a phase of life fresh and unex- 
plored, novel in its attraction, seductive as it was strange. 

He sat down on the low chair she had indicated near her own ; he 
bent eagerly forw^ard ; he opened the large portfolio with its Rus- 
sian-leather covering, curious monogram, and clasps of gold; and 
then, with an exclamation of eagerness and delight, he plunged into 
its contents. 

He came first upon her latest sketches — water-color drawings of 
the country round her on the Pyrenees ; the warm colorings of au- 
tumn sunsets over the giant hills lay rich and glowing before him as 
one after another he slowly turned each sheet. Then the first, 
bright tints of the spring met him; light, washy sketches of the 
sunlight silvering the rippling streams of" the coteaux, and the green 
tints of the opening leaves on the clustering Avoods. 

Numbers of these he turned over first, exclaiming and admiring 
as each came fresh upon him, wondering much w'ithin himself "why 
he had never really cared for water-color drawings before. He had 
never known, indeed, that he had any taste, to speak of, for scenery 
or painting, but this afternoon it seemed suddenly to develop into 
life; and w'hether the beauty of the paintings, the scenes they de- 
picted, or Madame Zophee’s soft voice as she leaned slightly toward 
him and murmured the name of each, formed the true element of 
its existence, he never asked himself, and he would have found it 
difficult to tell. 

By and by he came to different scenes. He had been pursuing his 
investigation calmly for nearly half an hour, turning sheet after 
sheet, Madame Zophee looking over each as he held it out to her* 
with a critical, considerate eye; looking with a real interest that was 
as natural and accustomed on her part as it was unfamiliar and un- 
wonted on his. 

She had been amused when he first asked to see her drawings, 
but, as he turned them over, she became rapidly interested in trac- 
ing her own progress displayed in them, from the first drawing to 
the last. Painting had been one of the chief occupations of herlife 
for several j’ears now; and as she sat there by him, leaning her 
cheek meditatively on her hand, glancing over his shoulder at one 
after another, her interest in her art and her love of it drew her out 
gradually from herself, absorbed in her mind all consciousness of 
aujdhing unusual in their circumstances, led her to take it as ” quite 
natural ” that they should scan her work thus tO'get'her, and ex- 


94 


THE SH]S'-MAID, 

pellecl from her thoughts any suspicions that this enthusiasm for art 
might be less genuine on his side, less familiar to him than to hei. 
She loved the Pyrenees, she loved her artist’s life among them; in- 
deed, for many years it was all in her daily routine that could be 
called life for her. 

Suddenly the scenes changed, and Gilbert exclaimed with aston- 
ishment, as he laid aside a sunny sketch of the valley of Bagnere 
and came upon, evidently, some other ranges of mountains, bolder, 
grander, wilder even than the Pyrenees— upon a painting of a great 
hill range by moonlight. 

It was a winter scene; the mountains, rising in the far distance 
across a great wide plain, seemed to glisten like crystal in wintery 
robes of snow. The moon looked drowsily forth through the night 
air on them and on the silent plain that lay, vast and immeasurable, 
outstretched like a glittering silver sea. A solitary fox, with earn 
erect and brush drooping, stole stealthily over the snow, the single 
speck of animation and movement visible amidst the silence and the 
solitude. Far away, near the sky-line, half buried in the drifting 
snow, appeared the gables of a building. It was a post-house — 
low-roofed, log-built, and unpretending, but promising in such a 
scene, to weary traveler in teljega, or sleigh, a cozy corner by a 
huge stove-side, and the dear refreshment of the golden chai flow- 
ing, hot and delicious, from a fizzing samovar. 

“Ah!” exclaimed Madame Zophee, softly, as Gilbert turned as- 
tonished toward her, with this sketch in his hand. “We have left 
the Pyrenees now and reached Caucasia; we have traveled far.” 

“ What an extraordinary picture!” he said, wonderingly, his eyes 
fixed still upon the wild, weird scene. 

“ A Russian steppe,” she exclaimed. “ Have you never seen a 
drawing of a bit of my country? That is very good, is it not? But 
it isn’t an original of mine; it is only a copy.” 

“It is beautiful,” said Gilbert. “But what a country! How 
glorious and stormy and wild it looks! And that fox stealing away 
— the wary old sinner! how capitally it is done!” 

“ Yes, at least I he original was. I have it upstairs.” 

•“Ah!” he said, absently, still looking, full of interest, at the 
picture. “ You did not paint it from nature yourself, of course. 
ISTo— how could you?” ^ 

“ No,” she said, smiling, “ 1 could not. When 1 was there 1 was 
much too young. ’ ’ 

“But you have been there, have you— in that wild, desolate 
place?” 

“ In that very place. I can just remember it— that p/c rising so 
grandly there, that opening beyond in the opening of tne mountain; 
and, oh, 1 can quite recollect the night we slept at that old post- 
house. It was near Gevzk, in Cis-Caucasia. 1 remember how Pet- 
rush, the little child of the official, was Kept up to amuse me while 
1 had my chai. I was a child myself then. ” 

“ Were you? Do tell me; go on; describe it to me a little more.” 

“What, the ‘ stanzia ’— the station, I mean? it was like maay 
others in Russia. 1 was traveling with my father, you know. We 
were coming from beyond the Caspian Sea; we traveled for weeks 
in a teljega, a sort of queer snow-carriage, you know, when we 

♦ - V 


THE SUX-MAID. 


95 

crossed Caucasia, and it was my first journey; so, of course, many 
little incidents cling to my memory, though 1 was not ten years old.” 

“ But your first journey. Fancy taking a child to such a country 
as that!” 

‘‘Taking her across it, you mean. We had to come over the 
steppes, 3 ’'ou know, to reach my father’s country from my own.” 

“ Your own?” 

“ Yes, Ah! you do not know my own land was a very sunny 
one. We were coming to the Pyrenees, to little Amelie les-Bains, 
and we had to come to Moscow — at least my father wanted to go 
there just once again; so we had to cross the Caucasian steppes to 
come by Moscow to Western Europe from my far-off home.” « 

‘‘ But is jmur country there— what you call your own?” 

‘‘ Yes, my own, my very own, for 1 was born there — beautiful, 
sweet land of the sun! luxuriant, fiower-gemmed, lovely land! Ah, 
yes! That is my only real patrie. See, I will show you a little 
sketch of it now : let us turn away from wild mountains and the 
dreary plains of snow. ’ ’ 

She bent over him as she spoke, and turned the collection of 
drawings rapidly over, and, choosing out another, gave it him with 
a smile. 

Swift transformation again! Sunshine (instead of moonlight) 
bathed a soft Southern scene in a dreamy, poetic luster that blended 
harmoniously with drooping, feathery foliage, and with delicate, 
bright-hued fiowens: a blue sea glistened across a silveiy beach, the 
aloe bloomed, and the rich tropical foliage waved above the flowers. 
It was the change from winter to summer, as from a frigid to a 
torrid zone, from the snow-reefed mountains and desolate plains of 
the steppes of Caucasia to the sunny Southlands on the Persian 
coasts of the Caspian Sea, To Gilbert it seemed as if he were 
wafted into dream-land, as vision after vision, all new, bewitching, 
and intensely suggestive, was passed, as if by magic wand, before 
his enchanted' view. 

‘‘The sunny South-land,” said Madame Zophee, quietly, ‘‘the 
land of my oldest memories and of my childhood’s dream.” 

“ And you were born there?” 

“ There, in that verandaed house This is, again, but a copy 
from my father’s paintings.” 

‘‘ Ah, your father?” he said, with a faint accentuation of inquiry 
in his tone, for all Morton’s injunctions were forgotten between 
them : and it seemed quite natural now that he should draw out, 
with softly expressed interest, all she might like to tell. 

‘‘ My father— ah! he is no more. We traveled that long way to- 
gether: we came across Russia, through all that wild snow, from 
our Persian home, and we came through Germany and to Paris, and 
down here to the dear Pyrenees, to Amelie-les-Bains — look at this 
sketch here— to this sweet, quiet little place across the valleys be- 
\mnd Bagnere. And there he painted a little, and wrote still a little, 
and then he left me to Angele, and he died. 1 was only ten years 
old.” 

“ Left you!” repeated Gilbert, ^he sketch dropping unnoticed into 
the portfolio. He raised his eyes, as she stood by him with clasped 


THE SUH-HAID. 


96 

hands and drooping, saddened face — raised them to fix them upon 
hers ^vith intense eagerness and interest. 

“ A'es,” she said, “ we were alone, he and 1; there was no one 
else — except An^ele. She was my Bearnais nurse, and she was 
faithful and kind and good; she kept everything for me- his books, 
and his money, and his pictures— until — ” 

“ Well! until — ” 

“You are curious. Why should I tell you?” she exclaimed, with 
an impetuous gesture. “ Why should you cm’e to hear?” 

“ Because it is beautiful; it is like a fairy tale to me; like the 
strangest, sweetest story I have ever reader heard. Go on — do! 
You were here — here near Bagnere, in the Pyrenees.” 

“ Yes, in the Pyrenees. Of course, that is why 1 love them, and 
why 1 come back "to them now — now,” she added, sadly, “ because 
I am alone again, and because I would see Angele, my good, dear 
Angele, who was such a mother to me in the old, old days.” 

“ Oh, but go on!” he exclaimed, earnestly, looking up at het 
■with the eager, boyish impatience so natural to him, and with a 
sweet light of interest and sympathy in his eyes that drew her out 
irresistibly to obey him and to go on. 

“ 1 stayed with Angele till I was twelve, here with my father’.^ 
books and poems and pictures ; and then a carriage came one day — 
there was no railway then — a great, huge carnage came, with foui 
horses, and two Russian servants, and a queer, pompous secretary, 
driving, with my good jMarfousha, in solemn s^ate, inside. They 
came from St. Petersburg from my guardian and they took me 
away. ’ ’ 

“ Away to St. Petersburg?” 

“ To St. Petersburg, yes; then to the plains of Yladimar, where 
we were many years — my guardian and Zaida, and 1. But I longed 
often to come "back here. 1 wished to see Angele again, and Bag- 
nere, and the mountains, and Amelie-les-Bains, and my father’s 
grave. ’ ’ 

“ How you have wandered across the world already!’* continued 
Gilbert, after a moment’s pause. “ But why were you living first 
down — in Persia, was it? Why, I mean, were you so far away?” 

“Ah! because my father went there before his marriage,” she 
continued, hesitatingly. “ He was sent away eastward, you know — 
exiled.” 

“ Exiled?” 

“ Exiled. And for a poem. Ah! a little thing it seems, does it 
not? — only a score of lines; but they rang through Russia, and cost 
him his freedom and his home. My father was the poet Variazinka; 
but, ah! of course, you have never heard his name.” 

“ I think 1 have never heard anything,” said Gilbert, shaking his 
head with amusing gravity and decision. 

“ Kot of Russian"^ politics, 1 dare say — at least very little; but, 
nevertheless, his was a name well known. They made short work 
of him and his career, as regards St. Petersburg; but they left him 
some choice of refuge, and so, when his Siberian term of bondage 
was over, being still exiled from Russia, the Sun-lands became his 
home. They w'ere thus my nursery, as 1 tell you; and therefore, 
when 1 came at length among my people of the far-lSioi th, and to be 


THE SUK-MAID. 


97 


brought up beside my friend Zaida, of fair coloring and flaxen 
locks, 1 seemed, by her, like a dusky sun-burned child of the South. 
Would you like to look at one more picture, just in illustration of 
my tale? See!” 

Once more she bent over her portfolio, and drew forth another 
water-color, which she placed silently in his hand; and he looked 
at it intently for some moments, utterly speechless, with a smile of 
wonder and admiration curling his lipVnd softening his eyes. 

It was a portrait this time— ^a full-length drawing of a girl. She 
was dressed in a quaint costume, a picturesque combination, though 
he wa5 not aware of it, of a peasant-dress from the plains of Vladi- 
mir, adorned with some bright-colored touches of a warmer and 
more Southern type. It-was the drawing of a young, energetic fig- 
ure, of a soft, dusky countenance, full of expression in eyes, and 
lips, and brow. Framing the portrait in a warm background, the 
scenery was curious and characteristic. Rich shadows, deep and 
broad, fell behind her, throwing up the figure into bold relief ; and 
across a vast, wide plain, a low, level sunset came straight upon 
her, flooding its rich, luminous glow upon her face. “The Sun- 
maid,” with several lines of poetry, was scribbled in the English 
language below. 

“1 did not paint that either,” she said, presently, with alow 
laugh. “ An American did it, a friend of my guardian’s, who 
stayed with us a long time in Vladimir once, years ago. That was 
the rough sketch, ami he gave it to me. He made a large picture 
from it, which he exhibited, I believe, under that name in his own 
country the following spring. He wrote the lines too. They are 
quoted from one of his American poets : 

“ ‘ I grant you fond, I grant you fair. 

Ye North-lands; and I grant you truth, 

And faith as fix’d as any star, 

And years as beautiful as youth. 

But in the North-lands there are none 
Of these bright daughters of the Sun. 

Like winter night, like glittering star. 

The shadowy eyes of the Sun-maids are.’ ” 

Gilbert read the lines aloud in answer to her words. The Sun- 
maid!” he repeated, softly. “ What a pretty idea, and what a pret- 
ty name!” 

“ The painter said the lines were not con’ectly quoted— only 
adapted, to suit his picture. 1 have often looked for them in En- 
glish and American books, but 1 have never come upon them any- 
where. The name pleased my guardian, however, and he used to 
call me so for a long time, except when he preferred his other name 
for me, which 1 dare say in my old sauvage days was the most ap- 
propriate, after all.” 

“ And that was—?” said Gilbert, dreamily, 

“ ‘ The Tsiganie,’ ” said Madame Zophee, as if musing over the 
recollection, half to herself, half addressing him, and a little laugh 
broke from her. 

“ The what?” said Gilbert, astonished, the word was so unfa- 
miliar and so strange. 

“ ‘ The Tsiganie,’ ” she answered again, in a low voice, with a 

4 


THE SUX-MAID. 


98 

deep flush covering her cheek fora moment as she realized what she 
had said, and as she glanced up, the words dropped almost unbidden 
from her lips. “ My mother was a native of these Southern lands. 
She lived and died there. When my father and 1 came to the Pyre- 
nees, we left her beneath the palm-trees by that Persian Sea. They 
used to say in Russia that she had been a gypsy of Cis-Caucasia, a 
Tsiganie: so my father’s was a poet’s marriage, and a poet’s history 
in every respect, you see.” 

‘‘The Sun-maid, indeed!” repeated Gilbert, still in an absent, 
wondering tone, as if he found in the term explanation harmonious 
and reconcilable of all the strange revelations she had been drawn 
out so curiously to make to him. 

” So they used to call me,” she said, lightl;^, this time, and wuth 
a sudden vivid smile, as if to dissipate the influence of retrospec- 
tion. ” So they called me for many a day, after 1 went to the chilly 
regions of Vladimir. ” 

“Did you stay there then— always ” — pursued Gilbert, again— 
” until— until— ” 

” Until I married,” was Madame Zophee’s reply. ” Until 1 mar- 
ried — yes, but it w'as not very long. These years were not very 
many; I married young.” 

” Madame Zophee,” exclaimed Gilbert, suddenly, after an in- 
stant’s pause, and turning to her as he spoke wdth the portrait still 
held eagerly in his hand, ” how difficult it is for me to understand, 
or even to conceive, anything really about your life!” 

“Idare say,” she said, smiling a little sadly in return, as she 
gathered up the sketches together. 

” It has been all so wonderful, so different from anything, from 
the history of any one, 1 have ever known before. It is like a be- 
witching story to me when 1 think of this — this portrait being you, 
with all that beautiful Southern life lying behind you, and that glori- 
ous country, and of all you must have seen and done. It is like a 
w^onderful book to me. Indeed, indeed it is! Tell me more, tell me 
more,” he went on. 

” What can 1 tell you?” she said, turning away with sudden seii- 
ousness. ” Of these old, bright days, 1 mean. I came, 1 went. 
From the far, far South up here, then to Vladimir, then hither and 
thither, always with the same sunny memories filling my heart; al- 
ways with the shadow and the recollection of that Southern home, 
of my mother laid beneath the palm-trees, and of my poet father, 
with his wild dreams, and brilliant thoughts, and strange, vagrant 
ways. And then afterward, later, always — always,” she continued, 
with sudden vehemence and pathos, as she turned from him toward 
the darkening wundow, and knit her fingers tightly together, ” with 
one deep, powerful sentiment animating my "whole being. It was 
gratitude, 1 tell you, a mighty gratitude;" the utter devotion of 
my life to another life— to him wiio had been to me and mine, 
to my solitude and my orphanage, and, earlier, to my exiled 
father, our constant, untiring guardian, deliverer, friend. That 
is the key-note of my history,” she added, still turning from 
him, with heaving breast and glittering, tearful eyes. ‘‘1 have 
told you of my guardian. Ah! let me forget myself, and let 
me tell you much of him— of that noble, devoted soul; of tliat 


the sun-:haid. 99 

grand, unselfish life; of the stern, undivided sacrifice Tie has made 
to country, to people, and to that glorious future he sees for them in 
which personally he can bear no part. Ah! if I could make you 
know our country as he taught me to know it, make you read its 
history as he reads it, make you care for its people and its future as 
he has made me care with him for them, then you might under- 
stand indeed why, satisfied, 1 live to sacrifice my small happiness to 
his aims and his honor, my passing and useless j^ears to his projects 
—all mapped out as they lie in their magnificence— my life in will- 
mg gratitude to him. ’ ’ 

Memory had become too much for her. She seemed to have for- 
gotten Gilbert, to have forgotten herself, to have lost her conti^l for 
-a moment, as she turned from him, as she stood there and spoke 
again, pouring out this time her words with rapid vehemence and 
passionate energy in accent and tone. 

“ You wonder, you wonder,” she said presently again, “ all won- 
der, doubtless, over the history of my shadowed life; over the key 
to my strange, solitary ways here; over my secret, my retirement, 
my reserve; and, if 1 told you, could you understand it? If I un- 
veiled the past to you, if 1 described that one sentiment that hurried 
on the crisis of my life, would you understand?” 

” Madame Zophee, I beg your pardon. I have vexed and troubled 
you,” he said. 

” Can you understand,” she went on— “ you who are of that cold 
religion that knows nothing of self-sacrifice, nothing of what we mean 
by the voluntary immolation of a life— can you understand what it 
is to set one’s self aside, one’s whole existence, to live in utter nega- 
tion of all that is one’s self! To live, satisfied if now and then we 
meet in the great spirit of nature, in the consolations of art, in the 
contemplation of the divine and beautiful, some inner recognition of 
our soul’s sacrifice, accepting that as being all fate, in reward or 
gladness, has in store for us. Such is my life; as such it lies before' 
you,” she continued. “ Can you understand it? Does it bear anj’’ 
meaning for you now?” 

” I see its sadness, I see its solitude!” he exclaimed, catching for 
■a moment an echo of the passionate energy of her tones. “But 
why, Madame Zophee, why?” 

The question broke from him before he had time to realize the 
force with which he put it, or to stay (in recollection of Morton’s 
warning) the forbidden words. 

“AYhy?” she exclaimed. ‘‘That is what I must not tell you. 
That is my secret. That is the key-note of the immolation of my 
life. I have promised. Can you not understand it? If gratitude 
demanded, if devotion required, could you not do it? could you not 
be silent? could you not be submissive*? could you not live solitary 
as 1 do — unloved, unloving, silent, and alone? Ah, Sir Gilbert, 
why have you done this?” she added, in a suddenly changed tone, 
turning- to him again with something of her usual composure and 
self-control. ‘‘ Wh)'' have you roused up all these memories? 1 was 
quiet, 1 was resigned; why do you come to me wdth questionings 
that pierce mj’- heart? For to none of them can I give reply.” 

‘‘1 beg your pardon,” he said again; for realization of his own 


100 


THE SUH-MAID. 


persistent curiosity seemed to come to him at her words, and her 
changed and softened tone. 

Suddenly the recollection of Morton’s warning and injunctions 
^came back to his mind; he rose and held out his hand. “ 1 beg your 
pardon,” he repeated again. 

“Nay, do not distress yourself, ” she said, letting him take her 
hand and retain it for a moment, as they stood face to face. “You 
have not pained me really. Perhaps it has done me good. But 1 
dislike to feel excitement. I cling to my self-control. A ou have 
disturbed it this evening. But— it will come again.” 

“ Hpw good you are!” he said. “ And how tiresome and how 
stupid 1 have been!” 

“ Au contraire,” she answered, gently. “You have been kind to 
listen with interest to these w’earisome reminiscences of mine. 1 
thank you, monsieur. You have been kind and sympathizing, and 
to me sympathy is very tempting and very sweet. Y^ou have 
bored yourself though, for a long time.” 

“1 have been very happy,”’ he murmured, holding her hand, 
still softly, as he looked with melting eyes into her face. “ 1 have 
been so happy! But Madame Zophee, say you forgive me, and 1 
■will go.” 

She remained silent then for an instant, as she looked at him, and 
made no answer to his pleading request. But a curious, anxious 
shadow came into her eyes suddenly, as they met his — a new expres- 
sion of peiplexity which he could not read. Her cheek paled, and 
she drew her hand away as she murmured, “ Good-by.” 

“Have 1 annoyed you?” he said then, eagerly. “1 hope not. 
"Will you not forgive me all my rude curiosity? And ■ruU you con- 
tinue to be my friend, Madame Zophee,” he -vN’ent on, changing his 
tone and smiling once more, in his frank, sunny way upon her, “ if 
1 promise and 1 do promise, never, never to pain you with such 
questionings again? Will you be my friend of the present, and let 
me help you, if only sometimes, if only for a little while, to forget 
the past?” 

She looked up at him once more then, searching his countenance 
as he stood by her, with an answering smile on her lips at his eager- 
ness, and yet with an anxious look still lingering in her eyes. 

“ 1 will promise,” he repeated, taking up the portrait for a mo- 
ment, and then laying it down again. “ 1 will promise. And will 
you enter the compact with me, and agree to be my friend?” 

“ Friends of the present,” she said, wdth a curious, sweet sadness 
in her voice, “ forgetful of the shadowy past?” 

“Just so,” he answered. “ Forgive me, and -we will forget it, 
indeed.” 

“It is not that,” she said, presently, in a low, tremulous tone. 

“ I did not mind. 1 liked telling you— only— yes— I should like, 
indeed 1 should like— oh, how 1 wish that 1 could tell you more!” 

He paused. 

“Y'es,” she l)egan, hesitatingly, and in a low, quivering tone, 
again; “ 1 did not mind your asking me. 1 do not know wby, but 
I did not mind it. Of course — yes — 1 did marry,” she continued 
slowly, her face drooping, and bier voice sinking almost to a whis- 


THE SUN-MAID. 101 

per, as she spoke ; and then her emotion seemed to choke her, and 
she paused again. 

“ Will you forgive me?” he broke in eagerly again, ” and I will 
go away.” 

Then she controlled herself, and once more she looked up at him, 
and for a moment her troubled eyes met full and fair the frank, 
shadowless expression in his. Bright, kindly, eager only because 
vexed that he should have disturbed her, and concerned only to wish 
her a friendly farewell. And as she looked up, and his hand clasped 
hers again in a frank, cordial pressure,, and she answered, unresist- 
ing, his genial smile, "words trembled on her lips — three or four 
words she wished and longed to say to him, to say even already then 
— but they trembled on her lips only, and were stayed. There was 
nothing in his voice or manner to draw them forth, nothing to nerve 
her, in defiance of all promises to sa}" them. They remained un- 
said. She smiled only, and strove to still the quiver of her lips and 
to answer him, as he repeated again, in earnest, self -condemnatory 
appeal, ” I beg your pardon for having troubled you; indeed, in- 
deed 1 do. Good-by. ’ ’ 

Then he left her, and went up through the woods to St. Hilaire, 
sauntering slowly sometimes, wfith eyes fixed on the ground, and 
again looking up toward the glow of sunset, as it fell through the 
trees, with a flush on his cheek, and a changeful, glittering light in 
his eyes. Thoughts seemed to crowd upon him, and new sensibili- 
ties and sentiments seemed to quiver and waken in the hitherto nar- 
row sphere of his inner being. Not love for her, such as many men 
would have felt then, springing up fervent and eager under the 
power of her uncommon beauty, beneath the glance of her shadowy 
eyes and the flash of her fleeting smile — not love altogether, but a 
strong tenderness stirred for her within his heart. 

He did not understand her; how could he? but she touched him 
— to-night his sensibilities and sympathies, as last night his intellect, 
his curiosity, his interest, his dormant artistic sense. All had waked 
up into quick vitality under her influence, Muth experience that was- 
te him as pleasant as it was unexpected and new. The sympathetic 
tenderness with which she had touched him this evening, in all its 
strong, chivalrous unselfishness of sentiment, was, moreover, most 
characteristic of him. Pity for her awoke, as he thought of her left 
standing there alone, facing her life with its deep shadows, and 
veiled f uturit 3 q and hidden past ; facing it in dreary solitude, nerved 
by some secret purpose, some single, noble motive for self-devotion 
— to liim unknown. And v/onder and admiration died out before 
that sympathy in his heart; and as he walked along the shadowy 
road, a sudden resolve came to him that he would, as he said, he- 
friend Tier — reflect her mysterious self-devotion with devotion from 
his side as^nselfish, as regardless of reward. 

In her solitude, in her sadness, he told himself he would cheer and 
brighten her, would help her to bury memory, and to live in all the 
sunshine which gilded her present life. How young she was, how 
desolate, and yet how noble and resigned! And he— how much he 
might do W her, perhaps; how much he might lighten, while he 
stayed here, the daily burden of her life! So he v’ould do for liei\ 
bethought; and she for him. He did not consider how it might 


THE SUX-MAID. 


102 

affect him at all that evening, not even sufficiently to realize how far 
he had already drifted from the moorings of his practical external 
existence, how far he had floated away across those tossing waves of 
the mystic sea that wash the shadowy shores of dream-land. He 
was far adrift, far on to them already; hut he was quite uncon- 
scious, and for himself quite unconcerned. 


CHAPTER XI. 

IN THE ALLE DE MORLASS. 

So began their sweet “ Platonic friendship,” and, once begun, it 
proceeded rapidly; for after that they met many times, in the easy 
unsought-lor manner in which people meet and glide toward inti- 
macy in those foreign lands. 

JMadarae la Marquise had many teas, with croquet and garden 
saunterings. There were little dinners and several jiicnics, and each 
gave rise to many errands between the chateau and the chalet to and 
fro. Madame Zophee joined some of the gayeties, and declined 
others. Some days she would seem eager to be with them, lighting 
up the party, as shq joined them, with the radiance of her spirits 
and the playful brightness of her variable mood. But other (and 
many days) she would refuse, with an air of weariness and depres- 
sion, and be quite proof against Gilbert’s efforts to persuade her to 
come. But, through all this coming and going, the intimacy of in- 
tercourse between the chateau and the chalet increased far beyond 
the limits of former years, and no one could tell how it came about. 

Nobody quite realized that it was a characteristic of Gilbert’s, 
brought, about by him, unsought for by Madame Zophee, unsuspect- 
ed by any one else; that it sprung simply from the exercise of the 
habit, on his side, of natural and easy intercourse with everybody he 
had ever known. The chalet stood at the park-gates of the chateau, 
as the vicarage stood on the village green at home. Some daily re- 
quirement of life made the excuse that drew him constantly to one 
house, as it had always done in the old days to the other. His aunt 
was the sender here, as his mother was at Erie’s Lynn. What 
difference need it make in his coming and going that, while the in- 
mates of the vicarage on Lynn Green were an obese old clergyman 
and his appropriate spouse* the inhabitant of the chalet herein the 
Pyrenean coteau was young, interesting, and endowed with attrac- 
tions as unusual and unfamiliar to him as her old euphonious desig- 
nations of the 8un-maid or the Tsiganie? No difference, he told 
himself, for he was her friend. Thus, full of his purpose of cheer- 
ing and enlivening her, he strode over the garden, and vaulted the 
railing, and plunged through the wood towaid Madame Zophee’s 
little house day by day, charged with errands and sugge^ions from 
the marquise, just as he used to stroll across the park at home, 
smoking his morning cigar, to match a skein of Berlin wool with the 
vicar’s wife for his mother, or change a tract for her, before he went 
-'fl' shooting for the day. And IMadame Zophee after a time became 
< to him, and did not forbid him, for she liked to see him 
The difference in their intercourse from all other acquaint- 


THE SUH-MAID. 


103 

ances she had formed on the Pyrenees was as natural to her as it 
seemed to him. He was so difrerent. He was so bright and uncon- 
scious, full ever of the idea or suggestion with which he had rushed 
down to her; so uncomplimentary, as many women would have 
called him, in his perfect self-possession and ease; so simple and 
straightforward in his expressions, so completely satisfied with the 
enioyment of his present life, so utterly without evideuce of senti- 
ment or susceptibility or romance, that Madame Zophee gave up all 
efforts to ward off their intimacy, and took him as simply for grant- 
ed as he took her. 

He was very happy all this time, and that was the only thing of 
which he was conscious — very happy; he was not at all sure, as he 
often thought over his evening Manilla, that he had ever been quite 
so happy before. Life was thoroughly satisfactory; and that being 
sensibly the case, it was not in Gilbert’s nature to speculate, to ques- 
tion, or to ask for more. 

Such was the history of these autumn weeks, and gradually, quite 
irresistibly, IMadame Zophee drifted into it — into that pleasant inter- 
courae, and into that winning friendship. She let herself join the 
happy party at the chateau, as weeks went on, again and again ; 
struggled out of it sometimes, truly, with curious, painful expres- 
sions shadowing her eyes and quivering on her lip, as she persisted in 
her refusal; but going again on the morrow, because it was so sunny 
and so sweet to her, and" years had been long and lonely, and that 
merry laugh was very musical to her saddened ear, and that change- 
ful smile very pleasant. The kindly glance in his blue eyes thrilled 
warmly to her heart, and the simple, cordial, boyish friendliness he 
poured* out for her was like a fresh spring of water in a desert and a 
sun- parched land; for such had life been for her these manj'" years. 
True to his resolution, also, Gilbert Erie, a thorough gentleman to 
his deepest heart’s core, obeyed his courteous instincts, and shrunk 
from all semblance of confidential converse after that day when he 
“ had gone too far,'’ as he told himself , and had pained her by pierc- 
ing beneath the shield of her self-control, and % pressing on sad- 
dening recollections while they turned over the pictures together. 
And now, as he had resolved that evening, in his walk to St. Hilaire, 
when her mood was shadowy, he sought to brighten her; when her 
spirit seemed turning toward that past (so unknown to him), he 
would strive instantly to draw her back, by some merry speech or bit 
of sparkling fun, to the present again; and she, echoing softly his 
laugh, answering his smile, and yielding to the sympathetic sweet- 
ness of his voice and manner, let herself drift on, and obeyed him. 

And so the autumn weeks passed, and December came at length; 
the move for the winter was arranged; and the Pau season began 
reall}'’ to set in. People were arriving by scores, the marquis said, 
as he drove back every day from the club; and the hotels very nearly 
full, and the houses all taken, and the Place Koyalea gay scene now 
every afternoon. Gilbert went little to town however. His uncon- 
scious attraction lay on the coteaux slopes; and, besides, the country 
was delightful to him, and long rides with Morton and Jeanne, and 
with everybody, filled up each cheerful day. 

It was about this time that he gave up talking of his projected and 
extended tour; and he said nothing farther, moreover, about re- 


THE SUX-MAID. 


104 

turning for the present to Erie’s Lynn. Partridge-shooting in Eng- 
land was over long ago, and he was but dimly conscious of who, 
this year, had shot his partridges tor him. Cub-hunting w^as well 
through, and the serious business of the winter setting in at home. 
Five days a week the packs were throwing off "within reasonable 
distance of his park-gates, and his string of hunters were led out 
daily, in prime condition for the season's work, over the soft turf 
edges of the avenues ; and much wonder was arising in the minds of 
his old groom and of the whip of the Lynn hunt at the non-appear- 
ahce of Sir Gilbert. 

Still more wonder, expressed, too, with some asperity, was smol- 
dering in the mind of Lady Anna, as October and ISTovember sped 
fast awaj’’; the frosty mornings of December set in, and still no word 
reached her of her son’s return. He wrote constantly, and wrote 
long, merry letters that would hav^e gladdened most mother' heaits 
with their glow of exuberant happiness and youth. “ The fact was, 
he had become quite at home with them all,” he wrote, “with 
French hours, and French ways, and French people. And this land 
of mountains had developed for him an extraordinary charm.” In 
writing to his mother, he forbore absolutely to analyze this charm; 
and, indeed, he would have found it difficult to decide whether it 
lay in the bright sunshine, or the lovely scenery, or the kindliness 
of everybody about him, or in some new curious faculty for enjoy- 
ment sprung up under alt these influences suddenly within himself ; 

- but somehow it all suited him. Scenes, surroundings, chalet, and 
^ chateau were all equally and collective!)^ delightful and harmonious. 
He analyzed nothing, but went on unquestioning, accepting the new 
enjoyments of each returning day. 

\Yith the arrival of winter, plans were settled and dates were 
fixed. Madame la Marquise was to take possession, for five months, 
of the house in the Rue du Lycee on December 15th. Madame 
Zophee had rented a suite of rooms on the Rue de Chaussee of the 
-great HOtel de France for the same period — a pretty set of apart- 
ments, with low windows opening on to a broad balcony that hung 
over the terrace and faced the glorious view of the Pyrenees. The 
De Veuils were coming to their little town villa; old Keffel had se- 
cured minute apartments in the Rue St. Louis, near both the F rench 
and English clubs; and Morton had found a couple of nice cheerful 
rooms between the Hotel St. Hilaire and the corner of the Place Roy- 
ale, commanding the view, and with plenty of sunshine, into which 
Gilbert was to be settled as soon as the move took place. He would 
live always with his aunt and uncle, they said, and dine with them 
every day ; but they had no room for him in the first floor of the old 
house in the court- yard and the ground-floor was let oflC satisfac- 
torily to an English family, large in number as in purse. 

The first hunting-meet of the season was a few days before they 
all left St. Hilaire. The marquis drove Morton and Gilbert over in 
his mail -phaeton, and Joe went on early with Brenda, to be ridden 
by Morton, and big-boned Mike, destined to be Gilbert’s mount. It 
was to Gilbert, from first to last, one of these “ wdiite-stone days ” 
to which memory looks back through all future life with a sense of 
enjoyment, that fifth of December, the day of the first hunting-meet 
at Pan. 


THE SUN-MAID. 


105 


There the slightest possible touch of frost in the air as they 
started down the coteaux in the early morning, and nothing could 
be more lovely than the view over mountain and valley and Gave, 
as they drove" through the crisp, clear, exhilarating; air, and bowled 
over the lanes between the russet hedge- rows. Gilbert had felt in 
radiant spirits from the fli’st moment when he emerged, cap-Ji-pie in 
top-boots and breeches, upon the gravel at the front door at St. 
Hilaire to light his cigarette, as he watched the mail-phaeton and his 
aunt’s barouche driving slowly round. Madame Zophee had dined 
at the chateau the night before, and, as he put her into her carriage, 
he had almost exl meted from her a laughing promise that even she 
would go to the meet and see them “ throw off ” to-day. And 
though she had shaken her head, and said, “ 1 never go to such 
scenes of publicity and dissipation, you know. Sir Gilbert,” she had 
smiled as she said it, half wistfully, half relenting; and he had an 
instinctive, buoyant sort of feeling of certainty that he should see 
her this morning somewhere along the Juran^on road. "When she 
drove she always went out early, very early, long before the ordi- 
nary fashionable world, so much he knew;* and her driving to-day 
was at least probable. 

Thus he was scarcely surprised when, as they turned a sharp cor- 
ner beyond the village of Gelos, they saw, along the white, straight 
road between the poplar-trees, her low-hung victoria, drawn by 
Volga and Vazuza, whose sleek black sides and arched necks shone 
in the sunlight as they trotted along. Ivan held them in to a sober 
pace, and Volga, doubtless approving, assisted him to restrain the 
fiery ardor of Vazuza’s youth; and so the marquis, by touching up 
his chestnuts sharpl}’- on the . flank, and giving them rein suddenly, 
soon brought up the phaeton at a quick trot to Madame Zophee’s 
side. Then he reined in the chestnuts as Ivan stopped the victoria, 
and Madame Zophee leaned forward to greet them. 

“Ah! lam so glacV’ slie said, “ 1 have just caught you on your 
’way. What a lovely morning you have for your hunt, messieurs! 
1 hope you will enjoj’’ yourselves very much.” 

“ But you are coming on, Madame Zophee?” cried Gilbert. “ V oa 
are coming to the meet?” 

“ 1 do not know; it is too far, 1 think,” she answered. 

“ It is quite close,” said IMorton; “ just on the other side the town 
— quite close; do come! Ivan knows the Route de Morlaas, for he 
has often been there of a morning with Joe and the horses. Do 
come! Jeanne is to be there, and all of them, and my mother is 
coming just behind.” 

“ But we shall be late— all we ladies— shall we not?” 

“ No, no. I won’t let Graham throw ofl; till my mother and you 
arrive. Come, do! You will like to see a meet, Madame Zophee; 
you have n«ver been to one ^’’et — and ’tis so pretty.” 

“ I should like it,” she answered, laughing, as she looked up from 
her seat in her low carriage to meet the glance of Gilbert’s eager, 
pleading eyes. “ Indeed, I should like it.” 

“ Then come. 1 will look out for 5 -ou,” said Morton, “ and keep 
a place for your carriage,' where you shall see everything. Do come !” 

“ Go on, then,” said Madame Zophee; “ do not let me keep you, 
at all events. Your chestnuts go faster than Ivan will let Volga and 


THE SUiT-MAID. 


106 

Tazuza trot, marquis,” she continued; ” but we will follow as fast 
as we can.” 

And on they went, Gilbert looking back, as the carriage moved, 
to raise his hat, to smile once more into the dark, dreamy eyes 
turned upward to him, and to watch as far as he could Volga and 
Yazuza trotting steadily, and the low victoria bowling smoothly 
along. 

” 1 think,” he said, presently, as they turned a corner and shot 
rapidly out of sight, ‘ ‘ a victoria is the prettiest carriage a lady can 
possibly drive in. I will get one for my mother when I go home. 

Everybodj’-, ladies and gentlemen alike, were going to the meet to- 
day. It was the first of the season, and in fact a sort of show meet; 
a turnout, as it were, of the forces ; a parade of the prospects, social 
and equestrian, English and foreign, cavaliers and amazons, as- 
sembled for the season to come. It was in the Allee de Morlaas, 
between a long row of chestnut trees that fringe the double roadway 
about two miles from Pau. 

Thus drawn by the marquis’ frisky chestnuts, toiling rapidly 
through the town, up the Place Grammont and along the Port 
Neuve, they in the mail-phaeton came quickly upon the gathering 
huntsmen and the rows of carriages assembled near the scene of the 
meet. 

And a very picturesque and pretty scene, in that sunny winter 
morning, it was. J'ar in the distance, seen in outline across the 
plain, rose the mountains, white and silvery, with soft clouds, and 
blue, vapory mists curling round their shadowy summits. On each 
side the Allee de Morlaas stretched fields where the crisp and short 
grass looked tempting for a gallop and where the low hedgerows 
promised many a good test for equestrian prowess, but offered small 
difficulty or impediment to the mind of a man from ” the shires.” 

In the Koute de Morlaas, under the glancing sunlight, the crowd 
was varied and gay. Red coats and ladies’ habits mingled numer- 
ously together, and laughter, and talk, and flirtation and merriment 
still superseded the serious business of the day. There were hunts- 
men, stout and slim, some well mounted and booted, looking ready 
for work; a few whose wavering seats, out-turned toes, tight waists, 
lilac gloves and gorgeous button-holes, recalled Joe’s description of 
the sorrows of the chase. 

The pack, the whip, the Scotch M. F. H., sitting, stern and deter- 
mined-looking, on his broad-backed steed, were all like those of a 
hunting-meet to be seen in every corner of Merry England on any 
crisp December day. And yet the gathering was most exceptional 
and characteristic. Its internationalism was the feature that struck 
you first. It would be difficult to mention a European nation which 
had not there its representative, each attired in as near an imitation 
as possible of the British hunting costume, and all eager to join in 
the transplanted British sport ; and from far beyond Europe came 
others who swelled the gay throng. 

There were many Americans — men whose keen, sharp glances, 
shooting rapidly hither and thither over the scene, expressed enough 
of courage to suggest going defiantly, even if recklessly, to the en"d. 
These generally rode good horses, and they reined them firmly and 
sat them well. 


THE SUin’-MAID. 


107 


Although all were very English for the occasion, in dress, in ac- 
couterments, in seat, in style, the true Briton was still easily dis- 
cernible; and as Gilbert reached the scene, and glanced over it from 
the box ot the phaeton, his compatriots and his acquaintances 
among them seemed peppered over the crowd, standing oul in some 
cases in a quaint contrast to their surroundings. There was Captain 
Hanleigh on a huge, powerful-looking horse; there w^as Bebe Beres- 
ford in a trim jacket, reining in a pretty bay mare, by the side of 
a young amazon in a short skirt tliat looked like business. She was 
mounted on a clever little chestnut that, as Gilbert remarked to Mor- 
ton, “ might go like a bird. ” 

“ And so she does,” said IMorton, in answer. ‘‘ That is the Miss 
Flora Netley Bebe has in charge — the American heiress, a very nice 
girl, they tell me, and a wonderful rider, as you will see; and there 
is the Duchess de Toledo, Gilbert, in that large carriage with the 
beautiful gray horses. She promises to be an historical character, in 
virtue of her husband Don Pedro. And that is the Spanish Infanta 
with the black mules in her carriage; and there on that sorrel is the 
young Comte de Gari, once heir of a Southern crown; and here 
comes Madame la Prefete. Ah! her husband is going to ride. 
And here is Joe with our horses. AVhat do you say, Gilbert? Shall 
we mount them now?” 

‘‘ Do, do!” exclaimed the marquis, who had guided his chestnuts 
carefully into a convenient position among the carriages, and was 
ciuite exhausted with his efforts at universal salutation with hat and 
finger-tips from side to side. ‘‘ Do get down; get on your horses. 
I will drive round to converse with 3Iadame la Prefete, on the 

other side.” r 

Once on Mike’s back, Gilbert felt quite at home. He followed 
3Iorton as he rode slowly through the crowd, raising his hat when 
Morton raised his, as from one carriage after another they were 
greeted with many bows and smiles; and into many a pretty face 
did Gilbert glance admiringly, as they threaded their way — faces fair 
and dark, English and foreign, grave aud gay. Nearly all gay, 
however; for the scene vras so bright and amusing, and the sun 
shone so cheerily upon them all, and the men bowed and compli- 
mented unlimitedly from side to side, and ladies laughed aud an- 
swered with many a repartee and playful sally; and the chatter of 
voices and the echo of laughter, and the rolling of wheels, and the 
champing of bits, and the ring of horses’ hoofs, and the impatient 
baying of the fox-hounds, made a strange jargori of noise and gay- 
ety and excitement, as they all crowded togther in the radiarit sun- 
shine, pleased with each other, delighted with themselves, full of 
anticipation of the season that was before them, and all enchanted 
that morning meets of the Pau fox-hounds, with all the balls, picnics, 
band-days, and other enjoyments, had once more begun. 

Pau had grown accustomed to Madame Zophee and her black Or- 
loffs, as people called them. Pau had nearly finished wondering 
over her, speculating upon her, and talking about her. She had 
lived in their neighborhood so long now, and had lived so quietly, 
so unobtrusively, and in every respect so entirely without giving 
cause for excitement on her account, that curiosity and speculation 
for want of food had died. So, though she came seldom among 


f 

108 the sun-haid. 

them, it caused a little more from each carriage than a passing re- 
mark when the low victoria and the trotting Oiloffs came slowly 
round the corner from the Route de Tarbes at the rear of the crowd, 
and drew up under the shadow of a broad tree. 

Gilbert had followed Morton’s lead into the center of the carriages. 
He was reining Mike by the side of the M. F. H., and was under- 
going a formal presentation, when he caught sight of the victoria 
standing on the fringe of the crowd of drivers and riders some dis- 
tance away. His aunt had just driven slowly past it. Madame 
Zophee had sat upright in her carriage to ^'change a smile and a 
few words and a touch of her finger-tips with her kind old friend; 
but now, as Gilbert suddenly saw her, she w^as alone again, leaning 
back, and watching the gay crowd. 

Even from there he could see that the expression on her pale face 
was very grave and quiet. She had come into this crowd because 
they had begged her to come; but; now she was there, she was 
wishing herself, as he well knew, in her loneliness, away. 

Gilbert bowed himself off from the mastei as soon as possible, 
and, threading his way through the carriages, again leaving Morton 
to struggle somehow to the side of Madame de Veuiks britzska, and 
passing Bebe with a nod, he succeeded, with some difficulty an'(i 
much careful guiding of Mike’s restless steps, in reaching the outer 
rim of the crowd, and arrived at Madame Zophee’s side. 

“ What a gay scene!” he exclaimed, as he drew Mike up close to 
her wheel, and bent down toward her, raising his hat. 

“Is it not? But not a new one to you. Sir Gilbert— a meet of 
fox-hounds — is it?” 

“ Not as regards the hunt, but the people, the surroundings, the 
scenery — everything is as new as it could be. 1 never saw anything 
the least like it in my life.” 

“ It is a pretty scene,” she said, “ and very varied. 1 think you 
have your whole society for the winter nearly all assembled here. I 
see most of my few acquaintances and a great many people quite 
unknown to me besides.” 

“ Yes, there are the Carlisles, in that pony phaeton; and there is 
Hanleigh, on that big bay,” said Gilbert, sitting upright in his sad- 
dle, and pointing from side to side with his hunting-whip. 

“ And there are the De Veuils,” answered Madame Zophee, “ and 
little Jeanne, looking lovelj^ with that bunch of azaleas in her hat; 
they just match the rose-tint in her cheeks, now that Monsieur 
Morton is speaking to her.” 

“There are quantities of people I do not know,” said Gilbert. 
“ I should feel quite lost in all this crowd, if you had not come to 
talk to me, Madame Zophee.” 

“ Ah, you will soon known everybody! Look! there is the hand- 
some Madame Philistaire just getting out of her phaeton to mount 
her horse.” 

“ Ah, that is the lady they chaff Bebe about,” said Gilbert, laugh- 
ing. 

“Do they? 1 do not know. Chaff? You mean laugh at him 
because he admires her. Why, everybody must do that, she is so 
very handsome. Do you nol think so. Sir Gilbert?” 

“She is not my taste,” said Gilbert, “nor, apparently, Bebe’s 


THE SUiT-MAID. 100 

lo-ciay. lie has never gone near her once; and a lot of French fel- 
lows are helping her on to her horse.” 

“Ah, he is occupied with pretty Miss Netley. They look very 
happy together, do they not? Monsieur Morton says she rides so 
beautifully. 

“ Yes, so he told me. An American, is she not? Why, there are 
people here from every comer of the earth!” 

‘ ‘ So there are, very nearly, only no countrymen of mine. They 
come seldom, for the last few years, to Pau. There is a group of 
Spaniards. I wonder how they can ride. And I think these are 
Irish, that party of sisters coming this way with many cavaliers. 
Ah, me. Sir Gilbert! wnat a confusion of people and horses and 
carriages! What are you all going to do? when are you going to 
start?” 

“ Immediately, I fancy. Mine looks like going, Madame Zophee, 
does he not?” 

“ He is very handsome,” she answered, looking up from her low 
seat at him — at him as well as at his horse. 

They seemed a part of each other, indeed; she took them in to- 
gether in her glance, the rider and the steed. Gilbert looked his 
very best on horseback, and in his trim hunting-dress. His brown 
hair, curlina: under his hat, glistened in the sunlight; his eyes were 
sparkling with fun and enjoyment; his seat was firm and erect, his 
shoulders square; and as Mike champed the bit and pawed the 
ground, impatient to be gone, and Gilbert reined him in with a firm, 
light hand, Madame Zophee’s glance softened as it rested upon him 
for a moment, and a keen, irrepressible sense of pleasure thrilled Jier, 
too, of admiration of his strength and his brightness, and of his 
vigorous, sunny youth. 

Suddenly there was a movement in the crowd, a backing of the 
carriages, a blast from the huntsman’s horn, a loud yelping of the 
hounds, and the ring of the master’s voice sounded above the din. 
They were starting — two minutes more, and they would be gone. 

“You are off,” said Madame Zophee, as Gilbert started suddenly, 
and, reining in Mike with a quick hand, glanced eagerly around. 

“ Y^es, by Jove! 1 believe we are.” 

“ Well, take care of yourself; enjoy yourself very much, Sir Gil- 
bert. Good-by.” 

“ Good-by!” he exclaimed, and he turned Mike suddenly and 
bent once more over her carriage. “ Good-by.” 

He raised his hat as he murmured the words, and he stooped 
close to his saddle-bow. Their eyes met, in the laughing excite- 
ment of the moment, in one glance of bright, soft farewell. 

“ I wish you good fortune,” she said, smiling, as he still bent 
toward her. “ Prastchite, prastchite,” she repeated, slipping uncon- 
sciously into her own euphonious tongue; and then, as he still lin- 
gered, still bent toward her, still said his parting words, still reluct- 
ant to go, she plucked from her dress the blushing rosebud, to 
which his eyes had half unconsciously wandered, and murmuring 
once more, “Good fortune!” she placed it, suddenly and impul- 
sively, in his hand. He smiled again, raised himself upright in his 
saddle, and put it into his button-hole with a happy and triumphant 
air. 


110 


THE SUH-MAID. 


Then there was more confused movement among the carriages, 
more sliouting and haranguing from the whip and the M. F. il., 
more blasts from the horn, and more yelping of hounds and gath- 
ering of huntsmen, and Gilbert glanced from side to side for a 
momeot while the color rushed over his cheek, and the excitement 
of the hunting fever flashed suddenly in his eyes. 

- Then, with a loud, unexpected cry of “ View— halloo !’" they 
were gone. The hounds had found already, in the little quiet wood 
that fringed one corner of the field, the foxes, and they were gone. 
The pack, let loose, stretched over the grass in an instant; horses of 
all varieties of spirit and power, given lein, followed as they best 

^ could; the whip and the huntsman led, one through the hedge, tha 
other over it. The crowd scattered; the carriages, in a long string, 
their inmates eager to see as much as possible, were driven rapidly 
along the road; and Gilbert, gathering Mike firmly together, 
glanced once more back toward the victoria, paused as he saw the 

- hounds, the whip, and the M. F. H. scattered beyond the hedge in 
one direction, and hunters scrambling confusedly in every other; 
and then, quick as thought, he turned his horse’s head straight upon 
the thorny hedge and paling, and lifting him with a touch of the- 
spur and a twist of his hand, before the exclamation Madame Zophee 

- uttered had left her lips, he had cleared it safely, and was galloping 
close upon the heels of the retreating fox-hounds far over the field. 

“ A famous run!” So Gilbert always declared it in the face of all 
defamers of the Pau hunt. Stretching far over field and moor and 
fallow their course lay, through all that crisp winter’s day; topping 
many a thorny hedge, scrambling over low, crumbling walls, clear- 
ing wide, shallow streams, facing turfy banks, with sunken fences 
beyond them that settled the fate of many a huntsman's hour, and 
running their fox to ground in the shadow of the earlv twilight far 
over the Landes toward Hordes. 

In the triumphant satisfaction of this last achievement, only Gil- 
bert, Miss Netley, and Vicomte Alto de Montilago were present to 
partake. To the Spaniard and the Englishman was the glory, to the 
American young lady not the glory only, but the brush ! They tell 
the tale still by the smoking-room fires on the coteaux, and at the- 
Cercles at Pau, of the run of that day; of Gilbert, as he still led the 
hunt, when the shadows fell, upon Morton’s big Irish steed, canon- 
izing Mike in the anrials of the year; of Miss Netley, on her wiry 
bay, coming close behind him, following his lead with unswerving 
pluck after Bebe fell out some miles behind; of the Vicomte Alto, 
riding firm on his rat-tailed, keen-looking horse, his hawk eye fol- 
lowing sharply every turn of the Englishman, noting enviously the 
strength of Mike’s long, rapid stride, watching eagerly for a chance 
just ” to lead,” if only for one last half-hour, in this splendid day. 
In vain; Gilbert came in victorious; and to hi m was the honor of 
handing Miss Netley the brush. 

” 1 would have given ten pounds to have done it!” said poor lit- 
tle Bebe, wistfully, as he met the triumphant trio riding slowly 
home together an hour or two later at the entrance of the Porte 
Neuve. 

” Thanks, a thousand times!” said Morton, whom they encoun- 


THE SUiN--MAID. HI 

tered a few paces further on. “You have added a hundred guineas 
to the value of Mike for me!” 

At the English Club they found Joe and the mail-phaeton and the 
inarqins. With much pride and satisfaction the former took posses^ 
Sion of the horse, pd complimented his rider on the feats which had 
already reached his ears; and Gilbert, amidst expressions of delight 
and congratulation from his uncle, sprung into the carriage. Then 
away they went, in the gathering dusk of the evening, toward the 
crimson mountains that glowed in the rich light of the autumn sun- 
set ; away they drove toward home. 

^ Say what you like about the Pau hounds,” exclaimed Gilbert, 
1 do not think I ever enjoyed a day’s hunting so much in my life.” 


CHAPTER Xll. 

ATIE YOU IN LOVE? 

It was a few days later. The preparations for the move to Pau 
from the coteaux were almost complete, and the last evening of that 
pleasant autumn season come. Madame la Marquise took the pros- 
pect very quietly, though one by one hei familiar domestic surround- 
ings were carried away from her, to be packed up carefully by old 
Baptiste or her devoted Angelique, and conveyed to town. She took 
it quietly, but the marquis was very much excited indeed. He 
tiotted about; he gave orders that were hopelessly confusing, and 
always directly in opposition to each other; he worried Morton ter- 
ribly over his elaborate arrangements for the transfer of Joe and 
all his precious charges to the court-yard of the Rue du Lycee hotel ; 
and altogether so hot and uncomfortable did the marquis make life 
at the chateau for these last two days, that it was little wonder Gil- 
bert was glad to escape occasionally to an atmosphere of repose. 

He might have found this under the chestnut upon the croquet- 
lawn, according to his aunt’s thinking, for there she established her- 
self daily (and finally, on the last day, for the last time) at the cere- 
mony of “ English tea,” as her friends called her afternoon repast. 
She assembled on that last afternoon with her usual circle: Madame 
de Veuil, the Comtesse de Beaulieu, and Baron Keffel ; each seated 
upon a straight wicker chair, each resting the points of their toes on 
the edge of a square of bright- col oied caqiet that, outstretched be- 
tween them, protected their feet from the dangers of autumnal 
damp. There Gilbert found them, as, escaping from his uncle and 
Morton, he lighted a cigar, and sauntered through the garden toward 
the croquet-ground in a dreamy, uncertain state of resolution as to 
the point to which his desultory footsteps would ultimately tend. 
He came upon them unexpectedly ; upon Baron Keffel talking tre- 
mendously in a high tone; upon the Comtesse and ]Madame de 
Veuil sipping daintily their hot tea, their toes resting on the carpet- 
rim; upon his aunt, who had forgotten the autumnal chill, carpets, 
and damp, and everything, and was holding forth, with many ges- 
ticulations of fan and finger, vehemently controverting the baron’s 
remarks. As usual, the" little coterie were respectively enjoying 
themselves in their own particular way. 


112 


THE SUK-MAID. 


“Ah, Gilbert,” called the marquise, as he appeared in sight. 
“ Here you are! Come, my dear child, come here. What are you 
doing?” 

“ I am having a quiet cigar,” said Gilbert, and he advanced, hat 
in hand, and bowing low in response to the French ladies’ greetings 
according to the orthodox French fashion, copied carefully for such 
occasions from Morton. 

“ A quiet cigar! Come and have it here, then.” 

“Would it be a quiet one if 1 obeyed?” said Gilbert, saucily, 
glancing with a merry look from his aunt to the baron. 

“You rude boy! What do you want? Where are you going?” 

“ Nowhere,” said Gilbert. “ Where should I be going?” 

His aunt paused aad scrutinized nis face for a moment. She had 
done so often lately, knowing that her scrutiny had been quite lost 
upon Gilbert, who had never in the least observed it. Quite as un- 
conscious, moreover, had he been of the train of thought that was 
running through her mind at that moment, and, indeed, had occu- 
pied it for some time past. She was glad to see him come then, for 
she had something to say to him, but yet puzzled, because she was 
wary and prudent; and this was scarcely the company in which to 
relieve herself of what she had to say. Without delay, however, 
then and there, that very moment, she felt she wished to say it. She 
looked up at her nephew, she tapped her fan thoughtfully for a 
moment upon her left hand, and she glanced at the baron and Ihe 
two French ladies in silence. Then she rose. 

“ jMadame, you leave us?” cried the baron, aghast, springing up 
at the same moment as she did, and nearly upsetting his tea -cup over 
his snowy and spotless pantaloons. 

No; 1 will return,” she answered, loftily, waving him to his seat 
again. “ 1 will take my nephew’s arm for a moment. I will give 
him a direction about some flowers — a commission upon which 1 
would send him that must be arranged before to-morrow. Sit still, 
baron; amuse the comtesse and Madame de Veuil for a little w’'hile, 
and 1 will return.” 

The baron obeyed her. Fractious, contradictory, unpleasant as he 
chose to evince himself at most times, he was still practically her 
slave. He obeyed her, took refuge in his tea-cup, prepared a series 
of acidulated speeches for the ladies left in his charge, and looked 
curiously after the tall, retreating figures of Gilbert and the mar- 
quise, as they moved slowly down the slope away from the croquet- 
lawn. 

The marquise leaned lightly on her nephew’s arm and walked 
silently beside him for a short distance, while he sent his cigar-smoke 
curling into the soft air, and looked down upon her with a smile, 
pleased that she should have risen to accompany him, and a little 
curious as to what she might have to say. He was quite uncon- 
scious, not in the least impatient, delighted to walk with her if she 
wished it, ready to stay with her as long as she liked. 

“ Have you had a smbws quarrel with Baron Keffel?” he said, 
presently, as he observed she still looked a little perplexed and grave. 

“ No, my dear child. The baron is not much more tiresome than 
usual; he is cross — yes, very cross- -but a capital companion. 1 call 
his a thoroughly bracing mind.” 


THE SUK-MAID. 


113 

“ Then why desert him? Have you really anything you want to 
say to me— anything you want me to do for you, aunt? If so, 1 
shall he delighted. Or have you only come awav to torment the old 
baron into a fever — eh?” 

‘‘ No, Gilbert. 1 have come because 1 torment myself: and 1 am 
going to torment you, dear child, as probably you will exclaim. 
Yes, 1 have something to say to you. Deai’, dear! you stupid big 
boys — what trouble you give us ! What mischief are you going to 
get into now, 1 wonder? Do you like being lectured, Gilbert? May 
1 do it? Will you be angry? You English sons are not like our 
French boys, you know. May I scold? May I peer into what you 
think and feel? May 1 question you? Will you t 11 me, Gilbert? 
Will you, my dear child?” 

She stopped on the pathway as she uttered the last words hurried- 
ly, turned toward him, and clasped both hands impulsively upon his 
arm. 

” My dear aunt, what can you mean? What is the matter? Of 
course, I will tell you anything. Ask me what 5^11 please. ’ ’ 

The marquise put her hands upon his shoulders now, and looked 
with tenderly glistening eyes into his face. 

‘‘ I believe you will,” she said. “ Tou are a good, honest, warm- 
hearted boy— you are. Will you tell me, Gilbert? May I ask you? 
May 1 , indeed?” J .y 

” Ask me! My dear aunt, yes— what you will,” he said. 

” Then— are you— are you, Gilbert,” she continued, with strong, 
passionate emphasis upon her words, “ are you falling in love with 
our little neighbor, Gilbert? with the Solava — with the mignonne 
- Zophee? Are you? are you? Oh, tell me, my dear boy! TTell me 
the truth.” 

A soft, low laugh from Gilbert stopped the pleading pathos of her 
words. He put his arm round her as she stood by him trembling 
with eagerness, and he looked down into her pretty, old face, afi 
quivering as it was with tenderness for him, and with anxiety on his 
account, and his eyes re-assured her; they were merry and twinkling 
less with sentiment than with fun. 

” Falling in love! 1 am sure 1 do not know,” he answered. ‘‘Do 
* you think lam?” 

‘‘ 1 think, 1 fear, 1 dread it, my dear child.” 

‘‘But why,” said Gilbert, “if 1 were? But am 1? I do not 
know. I never fell in love, aunt. 1 never saw any one I cared for 
the least bit in the world in that kind of way ; and now — no, I do 
not think so. I do not think merely being happy is falling in love.” 

“ I am so glad you are happy, dear child; so glad that we have ' 
been able to make you so, and that you care to be with us, and that 
we have prevailed to keep you here. But, Gilbert, 1 think if 1. real- 
ized that were true, 1 would send you away from us, as far as 1 
could too, and without delaj^” 

He laughed again. “ My dear aunt, pray do not be so tragical. 1 
am sure 1 am much too happy to be in love. 1 think Madame 
Zophee is delightful, and you tliink so, don't you, too? And 1 think 
St. Hilaire is delightful, and all of you — eveiybody. Indeed I do, 
and 1 am as jolly as I can be; but, then, I am jolly almost every- 
where; and, of course, Madame Zophee is the nicest person 1 ever 


114 


THE SUN-MAID. 


knew. But in love! I in love! Aunt, how can you trouble your 
head with such ridiculous ideas?” 

He looked so amused, and so unblushingly self-possessed, as he 
thus addressed her, that she almost felt assured ; still she lingered, 
her hand still resting on his shoulder, her eyes still searching his 
face. 

“ Where are you going now?” she said. 

“ "Why, 1 was,” he began, hesitatingly—” I was only, you know, 
going down, as usual, just to stroll round, aunt, to smoke my 
cigarette, and to see — well, if you like — 1 was going by the road 
round the outside of Madame Zophee’s garden, but I do not expect 
to see her. 1 think it was onl}’- to look at the view.” 

” Gilbert!” answered the marquise, suddenly, speaking again as 
if from a quick resolve. ” It is just this — we know nothing about 
her, absolutely, positively nothing. We love her; and that she is 
lovable, very lovable, Gilbeit, is almost all we know. She has a 
secret, she has had a history — so far she has told us. If she has a 
husband, or has never had one, we are even ignorant of that.” 

“All!” said Gilbert sagaciously. “Then, that 1 know at all 
events. She has had one, lor she told me so herself.” 

” Did she? Well, dear boy, then that is more than she has ever 
told to me.” 

” But, then, we are friends, you see, aunt,” he continued; ” really 
and truly, very great friends. She has told me lots of things — about 
her home and her young days, and her father, and her pretty name 
in her old country— 1 told you, did 1 not? — ‘The Sun-maid,’ and 
how she thinks her mother was a Tsiganie. ’ ’ 

“ She has told you much, my dear boy, that I never ventured to 
ask her; perhaps she will tell you more; she should not stop there, 
Gilbert. Knowing you as she now knows you, seeing you as she 
often sees you, she should tell you what— we all most want to hear. 
She should tell you more, Gilbert ; she should tell you more. ’ ’ 

” But, then, I never ask her. Ah, aunt, it would not be fair,” he 
answered, in earnest tone, “ would it now— to draw her out, I mean. 

1 never let her even talk of the old days if 1 can help it — of her past 
life and that kind of thing. I did once. 1 was so awfully curious, 

1 wanted so much to know, and I drew her on over a lot of pictures 
she showed me, till at last 1 saw what a brute 1 was and what pain 
1 was giving her — how much effort it cost her, you know, to speak 
calmly of her own life — to tell me what 1 asked her, or perhaps to 
conceal what she did not wish to tell. 1 never questioned her again, 
and 1 never let her talk of her old days now.” 

” There is one, just one thing she ought to tell you, Gilbert. Ask 
her, dear boy — if you will not do so, and you stay among us, 1 will 
ask her myself — ” 

” And that, aunt, is — ” 

“ That is,” she answered, interrupting him in a trembling, eager 
voice—” that is Gilbert, a most important question; that is, how and 
where her husband died?” 

“My dear aunt,” he exclaimed, horrified, “pray do not hint at 
such a thing— pray do not. Promise me, if only to please me— 
promise me, do not speak to her of her husband, of her past at all. 


THE SUiH-MAID. 115 

Why, she would think 1 had told you all she nas ever said to me, 
and I know she would never more be my friend.” 

‘‘ But, Gilbert, Gilbert — ” 

“ My dear aunt, please do not. Promise me, promise me. And 
as for being in love! Nonsense! Do 1 look like a man in love? 1 
am only very jolly indeed. VVhy, I feel simply that Madame 
Zophee is a part of all of you, of everything that is so delightful 
here : of the scenery, and the mountains, and the sunshine, and all 
this pleasant, bright, new life.” 

“ Ah-ha!” she said, smiling once more at him, pleased with his 
warm, enthusiastic words, and almost assured by the nierr}’’, uncon- 
scious expression in his voice and eyes. ” Ah, I hope, dear child, 
we shall not find she has been the real sunshine that has gilded all 
the rest of us for you.” 

“Nonsense, aunt, nonsense! Now go back to the baron and 
make him happy again, and 1 will go and finish my cigar and my 
stroll. I should like to see that view of Bigorre from the gate of the 
chalet just once more, and, you know, we are all off to-morrow.” 

“ Well,” soliloquized the marquise, as Gilbert left her, and she 
turned away — “ well, 1 have given my warning and made my re- 
monstrance, and that is surely about all that 1 can do ; but 1 cannot 
help wondering what sort of woman Anna has turned out by this 
time, and 1 wish 1 could get her here to look after her own boy. 
Ah, and here is mine.” 

The last remark was to Morton, whom she came upon at the mo- 
ment round the corner of a path on his way from the stable. He 
paused, astonished to meet her alone. 

“ 1 have just parted with Gilbert,” she said, 

“ So 1 hear,” said Morton, for at that moment a ringing whistle 
came to them, echoing merrily through the woods, growing more 
and more distant as Gilbert went his way. The marquise listened 
and smiled, and a pleased, complacent look came into her eyes. 

“What a happy boy it is!” she said. “ Morton, what do you 
think? Is he likely to fall in love?” 

Moiton glanced at her curiously, and burst into a merry peal. 

“ Gilbert? Gilbert in love? Is that what you are troubling your- 
self about, little mother? Who — is it the Solava? Gilbert — what 
fun! what an idea! Why, I do not think he has a thought of such 
a thing. It is not in him. Why, maman, have you never seen a 
man in love? and you talk of Gilbert!” 

“ 1 have seen you, if you mean that, you silly, romantic boy. 1 
have seen you tearing your hair and sighing your heart out, and that 
(though 1 won’t tell Jeanne so) many a time. But you are half a 
Frenchman, my dear Morton; and Gilbert will take it in English 
fashion, whenever and in whatever way it comes.” 

“ And if it does come, may 1 be thereto see!” said Morton, laugh- 
ing. “ Gilbert holding — anything — how does your English poet put 
it, mother?—' somewhat nearer than his dog, a little dearer than his 
Horse ’? Impossible! Nothing is to him, 1 am quite certain (if you 
asked him really), half as near and dear as either of the two.” 

• ‘ But — the Solava, Morton. He likes to go to her. What do you 
make of it all?” 

“ Mother,” said Morton, very seriously, “ I was once in love with. 


THE SUN-MAID. 


116 

IVladame Zophee — you know I was; and when I remember what I 
felt, w'hen 1 know what she is to any one capable of being attracted 
by her, I cannot have a moment’s anxiety on Gilbert’s account. 
Look at the cool manner in which he takes her. He comes home, 
and it amazes me, 1 can tell you, often to see him sitting down to 
eat his dinner complacently, after half an afternoon in her society, 
at a picnic or at croquet here. ‘ Very jolly ’ and ‘ capital fun’ would 
be the outer limits of his enthusiasm, if you examined into his feel- 
ing for Madame Zophee or for anybody else, or indeed for life in 
general. He is a dear good fellow, but it is not in him to fall in 
love, mother; no fear of him.” 

The distant ring of Gilbert’s whistle still reached them as they 
paused a minute and listened once more ; and then the mother and 
son smiled reassuredly to each other, and she took his arm and strolled 
back to the croquet-ground. 


CHAPTER Xlll. 

A PRESENTATION. 

The marquise meant well, but if there was any cause why Gilbert 
Erie should not fall in love with Madame Zophee Variazinka, his 
aunt certainly took a very dangerous course in her efforts to prevent 
his doing so. Almost any other man but Gilbert as he smoked his 
cigar and strolled through the woods below St. Hilaire, after that 
conversation, if he had never before thought of falling in love with 
her, would have suddenly and instantly discovered, there and then, 
that he had done so. But to Gilbert it did not come In this way. 
He assured himself it was ridiculous; he was not in love. They 
were friends; theirs was a charming, very entrancing, but quite 
Platonic friendship; he wms far too happy at present to think of any- 
thing more. Being in love implied so much — his mother, the future, 
home; confusion and difficulty of every kind. And that home was 
a dream)" distance to him just then, and the future liad no existence 
at all. 

” So absurd!” he murmured to himself. “Why cannot people 
be friends together without some one thinking immediately of that 
kind of thing?!’ 

So he soliloquized as he passed out of the wood, as he reached the 
pathway by the stream, as he wound round the ■wall where the 
creepers hung low above him, as he neared the rustic gate which in- 
closed Madame Zophee’s home. The roses were all gone now ; there 
were bright-hued flowers lingering here and there, dotted like stars 
over beautiful late creepers and southern shrubs, that clustered in 
the luxury of the garden ; but the roses had shed all their petals, and 
the leaves from the old gnarled trees had fallen on the grass and 
gravel, and strewed both with a rich carpet of russet and crimson 
and gold. The scene was changed since he had first come there 
many weeks ago — more changed than he was! It was winter here; 
the chill blast had swept over mountain and valley, the leaves had 
fallen, the rich bloom was gone, the after-glow of the sunset was 
struggling already with the deep shadows of the night; but for him, 
as he stood there, his eyes glistening as he paused to look back and 


THE SUX-MAID. 117 

gaze over the glorious prospect — for him the year of life was still 
bright and beautiful. It was still all summer in his heart. 

“Ah!” he turned suddenly io exclaim, fora voice reached his ear 
— the voice of some one coming down the garden toward the gate, 
but he paused with the exclamation; for a second voice arrested 
him, answering immediately the well-known tones; and as he turned 
and approached the gate-way, Madame Zophee, accompanied by an- 
other lady, came down the path. He stopped as they approached 
him, and raised his hat. 

The tall figure of the lady who walked by Madame Zophee’s side 
was unknown to him. She was dressed in black. Her head was 
somewhat turned from him, and she continued speaking, rapidly and 
low, to Madame Zophee as they drew near. He could not see her 
face, but there was something that arrested him in her aspect and in 
the soft fall of her voice as she came down the garden; something 
unusual in her mien and in the graceful dignity of her figure that 
commanded irresistible admiration and interest as she approached. 
Gilbert would have described her, if any one had asked him, as a 
woman “ essentially high-bred,” from the instant impression caught 
in that one glance at the pose of her head, at the firmness of her step 
upon the leaf -strewed turf, and at the beautiful hand which lay un- 
gloved upon her black muff, delicately fair and small, and sparkling 
with jewels. 

Madame Zor.hee looked a little flushed and excited as the two ap- 
proached together, and the color deepened as she turned and per- 
ceived Gilbert across the gate. She glanced at her companion, and 
then looked again at him, and her lips parted in a bright smile as 
the lady bent her head slightly, apparently in silent assent to some 
request understood though unspoken by Madame Zophee. Then 
she turned her glance upon Gilbert, who stood pausing, uncertain 
whether, as usual, to push open the gate. IVIadame Zophee laid one 
hand uxK)n it and drew it open, and, still smiling, she stretched out 
the other hand, the left one, to him. 

“Sir Gilbert,” she said, “good-evening;” and then she looked 
shyly at her friend again. “ Let me present you,” she added, in a 
low voice, ‘ ‘ let me present you to — the princess. ’ ’ 

Gilbert knew now to whose acquaintance he was in these word's 
admitted. He bowed low, and then looked up, to meet the smile 
and to return courteously the gaze of surely the sweetest eyes that 
ever spoke truthfully, the expression of a noble, a tender, and a 
sympathetic heart. The Princess looked curiously at him for a 
moment as she bowed and smiled, till Madame Zophee added, ‘ ‘ The 
nephew of Madame de St. Hilaire.” 

“Ah!” she said then. “1 am very pleased to know you. Sir 
Gilbert. Your aunt has been hoping for a visit from you for a long 
time. 1 am glad you have come to her. ” 

“Come and going to stay, too,” said Madame Zophee. “Sir 
Gilbert is enchanted. Princess, with the life of the Pyrenees.” 

“ Ah, indeed! I am glad. Pau is truly a ‘ Paradis terrestre.’ I 
am sure every one must find it so.” 

“ Pau 1 scarcely know yet,” said Gilbert, “ but 1 am enchanted 
with the Pyrenees. ” 

“ And you will love Pau too when you have stayed there. We 


118 


THE SUX-MAID. 


have the mountains still before us, there, you know. You are com- 
ing to town, 1 hope, with your aunt?” 

‘‘I am,” he answered. ‘‘To-morrow, Princess, we all move 
from St. Hilaire.” 

‘‘ And what day do you come in, cherie?” she continued, turning 
to lay her hand on Madame Zophee’s. ” I am so glad that clever 
Varle has ordered you to leave the coteaux this year. I cannot bear 
to think of you alone here in the winter.” 

“You are kind. Princess,” said Madame Zophee, “but 1 am 
sorry to leave my mountain home. It is to be, however, and I go to 
town in a day or two like the rest!” 

“Ah! ] am glad of it. That is well. The dear marquise will be 
so happy to have you with her Will you give your aunt my love, 
Sir Gilbert? Will you tell her I will come and visit her immediately 
in the Rue de Lycee? Indeed, she would have seen me to-day, but 
I only arrived yesterday, and started to drive late this afternoon, so I 
had only time to come and see how my little Zophee has been all the 
while 1 have been away from her? Will you tell your aunt. Sir 
Gilbert?” 

“ 1 will, Princess,” he answered. “ She will be delighted to hear 
of you ; only yesterday she was wondering whether you had arrived. ” 

“ And only yesterday I came. And the baronne has not arrived, 
Zophee,” she continued, “ so to-day 1 have come out to you quite 
alone. She comes to-night. But 1 must be going; it. is getting 
late. Where is Ivan? MHiy do they delay with the carriage?” 

“ I hear it. Princess,” said Madame Zophee. “ See, it comes,” 
and Gilbert, as she spoke, stood aside as a large sociable, with a 
foreign-looking servant on the box, and Ivan walking by the horses" 
heads, drew slowly up to the gate. 

Gilbert sprung forward to open the door. The Princess encircled 
Madame Zophee in a gentle, lingering embrace, murmured once 
more in a few soft words her delight at seeing her again, her pleas- 
ure at the prospect of their being neighbors for the winter in town; 
and then she turned with a gracious salutation to Gilbert, let him 
take her hand and assist her as he stood with uncovered head by the 
carriage, glanced at him again with those sweet, cordial eyes of 
hers, and in another moment he had closed the door of her carriage, 
and she had driven away. 

“ 1 feel more at Home in the world,” said IVladame Zophee, softl}^ 
as they stood together on the gravel and watched the carriage go 
down the hill — ‘ ‘ I feel more at home in this wide, wide world, now 
that the Princess has returned to Pau.” 

Gilbert smiled as he answered her, and they pursued the subject a 
little, he questioning hesitatingly, and she lingering, as she an- 
swered, over the pleasant recollections of her visitor with a loving 
intonation in accent and voice; then she said suddenly to him, as he 
still remained standing by her side. 

“ Have you brought any message for me this afternoon. Sir Gil- 
bert? Any message from your aunt?” 

“ Only will you come to St. Hilaire this evening? ‘Will you come 
back with me?” 

“ Did she send you to say so? I scarcely think it, for she was 


THE SUX-MAID. 119 

here and asked me, and I refused some hours ago. Did she send 
you to ask me again?” 

‘‘ No,” he said, laughing. “ 1 do not think she did.” 

And have you no other message?” 

“ None ■whatever,” he answered, emphatically. 

“ Then — ” she paused. 

“Then why did 1 come? 1 did not come, Madame Zophee. 1 
only found myself here; arrived somehow unconsciously, by a sort 
of instinct, 1 suppose. 1 think 1 wanted to see the view from here 
just once more. We are all going away, you know, to-morrow.” 

“ Yes, alas!” 

“ Alas! 1 say too. I am sure I shall not like the life down in the 
town there half as much as 1 have liked St. Hilaire; but, at all 
events, I am glad you are coming also.” 

‘ ‘ 1 should be sorry if I were parting with you all, but 1 cannot 
say I am glad to be going to live in town. ” 

“ But, Madame Zophge, you cannot like being here alone, can 
you? when they are all gone from St. Hilaire, 1 mean. 1 cannot 
imagine you here, then. How solitary, overpoweringly solitary, it 
must be!” 

“ That is just what it is— overpowering. 1 like it, but 1 dare say 
it is not good for me, as Varle says.” 

“But— like it?” 

“ Cannot you imagine it? You, Sir Gilbert, with your love of 
nature, and your feeling for the glories and the wildness of a mount- 
ain life?” 

“ Yes; I could enjoy it, but, then, 1 should shoot, and hunt, and 
scramble al)out, and explore the mountains more than gaze at them ; 
but for you — 1 am sure it must be much better to be in town.” 

‘ ‘ 1 suppose so. 1 was thinking of it just before the princess came. 
They have packed my books and sent away my piano and my easel ; 
in fact, deprived me of all my occupations, so 1 came out early in 
the afternoon here, and leaned upon the gate, and said good-by to 
my view, and to my solitude, and to all my mountain thoughts.” 

They leaned upon the gate again, now side by side, and Madame 
Zophee looked away over the valley, and Gilbert turned his gaze 
upon her, waiting for her to speak again, and watching the dreamy 
absent expression gathering over her averted face. 

“The mountains have been so long my companions, ” she said, 
presently; “ the only presence in my life, for many a day, that was 
powerful enough lo take me out of myself.” 

She looked intensely sad for a moment, and he smiled with his 
usual effort to rouse her and draw her thoughts away from her mem- 
ories, as he replied: 

“We do not want you to he anything but yourself, Madame Zo- 
phee, and so we are glad we are going lo take you from the mount- 
ains, for they often threaten to take you from us.” 

‘ ‘ Ah, Sir Gilbert, 1 think it is the happiest symptom in your 
character that you have so little understanding of solitude, or what 
it means and brings.” 

“ And j^et l am often alone.” 

“ And a cheerful companion to yourself you are always.” 

‘ • When I am alone 1 have generally the dogs, you know, and my 


120 


THE SUN-MAID. 


gun, or a horse which wants a great *dea] of thinking about, and 
these constitute society at any time. ” 

“ And 1 liave my dogs and my flowers, and I find them society; 
but, then, I also have myself; and dogs and flowers, nay, even 
music and painting and books, are not suflicient for me, and I fall 
sometimes, as this afternoon, into fits of sadness, and find myself 
reveling in melancholy, recalling fruitlessly the past. Then it is 
that the mountains help me. 1 wi.sh 5'ou understood Russian, Sir 
Gilbert. How I wish you knew one of Derzhavin’s poems, for it 
does so exactly describe what I feel when 1 stand here and lose iny- 
selj in the mountain prospect ; it expresses the feeling which I seek 
when 1 rush away from m}- self out here. I do not mind the loss and 
waste of my one little life when I have once caught the spirit of his 
poem.” 

“ Tell it to me,” said Gilbert. 

“ Repeat it to you? Derzhavin’s lines in my poor translation? 
Would you care to hear them? Shall I?” • 

“Yes, do,” he said, for at that moment tne feeling was strong 
within him that he cared little what she repeated to him so long as 
she went on talking and did not send him away; and Madame 
Zophee, after pausing an instant, gazing over the mountains toward 
Bigorre, began, as he asked her, Derzhavin’s long and b(!autiful 
poem. In soft, full-flowing tones she repeated it to him— an En- 
glish translation — her oMm. His head bent as he listened in 
reverence, in admiration of the sentiments and sublime thoughts and 
magnificent imagery which she spoke to him straight from her own 
veiled heart and spirit in the language of a poet of her beloved 
land; and his eyes glistened with kindling emotion as her voice sunk 
low, while, with exquisite pathos and intonation, she murmured the 
last few lines : 

“ ‘ O thoughts ineffable I O visions blest ! 

Thoughts worthless my conceptions all of Thee, 

Yet shall thy shadowed Image fill my breast, 

And waft its homage to thy Deity. 

God ! thus alone my lowly thoughts can soar, 

Thus seek thy presence. Being wise and good ! 

’Midst thy grand works admire, obey, adore; 

And when the tongue is eloquent no more, 

The soul shall speak through tears of gratitude.’ ” 

Her eyes -sparkled and her cheek flushed crimson again, as in soft, 
passionate accents she repeated, half to him, half to herself, these 
lines. 

“ But, Madame Zophee, it is very bad for you, I am certain,” he 
said, suddenly, “ to stand all alone in the solitude and storms of 
winter here and feel like that. ’ ’ 

“ But is it not beautiful?” she answered. “ It is Derzhavin’s 
poem on the Spirit of the Universe— on God. Did 1 never tell you 
about him— about Derzhavin, the young Guardsman of Caterina 
Seconda, who Avrote ‘ The Ode to the Kirghiz Kaissak Princess 
Feliza?’ Did I never tell you of him— how he stood sentinel at the 
palace gate as Catherine passed to her coronation, and was fired by 
the glories of his czarina with the inspiration of his w<3nderf ul poem? 
Ah! he is one of my favorites. 1 will translate more for vou, Sir 
Gilbert, and try to bring you to an acquaintance Avith him.”“ 


THE SUH-MAID. 


121 


“ But 1 do not like him if he teaches you to love your solitude, 
when we all want you so very much at St. Hilaire.” 

” He does not teach me; he only comes with expression, with 
language for my solitude when its sadness weights me sometimes 
into silence, leaving me, for myself, no speech. Then Derzhavin 
speaks for me, and draws down the cool dew of the solace of the 
mountains. Ah, Sir Gilbert! go back to St. Hilaire. And you 
must go without me; you would all find me a sad companion to- 
night.” 

He had failed to rouse or cheer her this evening; she turned from 
him completely, and leaned her arms on the gate and looked far 
away. 

“Madame Zophee,” he said, presently, “ do you believe in Pla- 
tonic friendship?” 

She looked quickly round at him. “1 do,” she said, emphatic- 
ally. “ 1 hope, indeed 1 do.” 

“ It is a ridiculous term,” he said, “ but it is the only way that 
expresses exactly the sort of thing I want to say. It is just this: 
You know 1 have never in all my life before had the sort of friend 
that you are to me; any body, 1 mean, who took an interest in my 
ignorance, and tried to teach me something and to make me more 
of a fellow than 1 am; and 1 cannot tell you in a right sort of way 
how much 1 feel for you, how dreadfully sorry I am when you get 
melac choly and sad, and how awfully bad I think it is for you to 
be lonely and silent, and to tell no one your trouble — it is very bad. 
And all I want to say is — of course, 1 do not wish to seem curious, 
or as if 1 were asking you questions, or trying to find things out — 
but, Madame Zophee, if it would be any comfort in the world to tell 
me the whole story of your life, you know it would be all safe wi^’'" 
me, and 1 would Just take it as a kind of mark of our frien-* 
and nothing in the world more.” 

He spoke in his usual matter-of-fact and cordial 
as she turned to him, were resting full upon b^ 
the kindly feeling and the warm friendship f'’ 
grew very pale as she answered him. 

“ Sir Gilbert, if you only knew,” she 
whole story of my life is the very thi’ 
only knew — how much — how mu' 
is tiie one thing impossible for 
respect a promise, do you nf^ 
really kept?” 

“ Certainly I do,” he said 

“ Well, then, as 1 told-y^ 
that binds me here, that i' 
and companionship, and 
of that promise, and let 
its limits, 1 defy the v 
tones, “ of one to w> 
and mine through r 
me, and of everv 
his life; one t" 
this— my 
% “ Tb' 


k 


122 


THE SUH-MAID. 


Madame Zophee, what 1 meant? Not curiosity, but friendship, 
made me speak just now.” 

“ And friendship for you, for myself, would make me speak, Sir 
Gilbert; but my lips are sealed. None but the mountains can hear 
my story; from none but the Spirit of Nature can I seek soothing 
sympathy and relief. Can you wonder, then, that I love my soli- 
tude and mourn to leave my companion hills?” 

“Ah, but even with silence lying between us, Madame Zophee, 
you will say, do you not, that we may be friends?” 

“ The kindest friendship 1 can show toward you, toward any one. 
Sir Gilbert, is to bid you go.” 

“ No, no; not that, at all events,” he exclaimed, laughing. 

“Go!” she went on, “away from me and from m}’' saddened, 
shadowed life. Go away. Sir Gilbert, now, and I will remember 
with pleasure our friendship; nay, 1 will regard you, if you like, as 
my constant, kind, though ever-absent friend.” 

“ But, Madame Zophee, 1 am not going,” he said. “ You must 
put up with me a little longer when we all get to Pau, even as a 
present friend. Come, do not let me leave you in a sad mood ! Will 
you not come to St. Hilaire, or must I really go home without you? 
1 declare the inexorable dinner-hour has arrived — fancy its being so 
late!— and my uncle is a monument of punctuality. l7nust go. 
Say good-night to me, Madame Zophee. Will you not let me feel 
before 1 leave you that there is a delightful winter before us all, and 
that whatever happens we shall still be friends?” 

Why not, indeed, while he looked so unconscious and so self- 
possessed? Why not take that friendship which, as he went and 
came before her, -was ever so pleasant and so sweet to her? Why 

■ befriends?” 

take your friendship,” she said, slowly. “ Only—” 

" finish the sentence? Could she ,not put it in any 
by any word dropped as if unawares, could she 
be present and yet preserve the sacred secret 
she say it? “1 will take your friendship 
^ ” This sentence almost formed itself 
him, and then again it was stayed; 

'^^as no appoach to it in the smile, 
rds, or in the ringing voice in 
^iUStoff , as, after clasping her 
'-night,” and turned up the 
as after many months and 
let again. 


was a period of 
Hue de Lycee 
threatened 
ver, im- 




THE SUX-MAID. 


123 


tliey tormented every soul of the household (excepting the marquise) 
to the verge of despair; and when they had exhausted every sort of 
vituperation upon their neighbors, they acted, fortunately, as safety- 
valves for each other, and so by dint of time and trouble upstairs 
and down, in the kitchen and salon, the menage settled down. 

Then Gilbert was “arranged,” as Baptiste expressed it, in his 
apartments; and his English groom and valet, with a couple of his 
hunters, arrived — a proof that he was going in for the winter seri- 
ously. 

Then Madame Zophee came, and the rooms on the Rez de 
Chaussee in The France were fitted up, and looked quite “ like her- 
self,” as Gilbert asserted when he escorted his aunt to visit her the 
day after she arrived. They looked warm and comfortable and curi- 
ous, like a bit of the chalet from the coteaux, like a bit of romance 
in the midst of life practical and external, like a picture of foreign 
lands, and strange scenes, and quaint associations, in the midst of 
familiar things. 

The windows were filled with rich exotics brought by Yasilie and 
Ivan from their carefully tended greenhouses on the coteaux. Her 
easel was set up, her books covered the tables, her ebony-cased piano 
traveled over the valley too; and numberless little curious ornaments 
and familiar objects had been gathered from the rooms at the chalet 
by Marfa, packed up and conveyed to town, to make the bare hotel 
salon more fitting, in her opinion, for the habitation of her 
“ doushinka,” her “ galoupka,” her little, dainty, tenderly guarded 
queen. 

In due time all were comfortably settled down, and the winter 
fairly began. The usual coterie of St. Hilaire soon re-formed itself 
in the Rue de Lycee in Madame la Marquise’s rooms; one or two 
were absent; but others, wanting on the Pyrenees, joined the pleas- 
ant circle here. The Princess was a visitor, constant and ever-wel- 
come, and many others, whose acquaintance we may still make as 
we glide along. Once a day, at all events, as the twilight fell, the 
large glittering drawing-room, with the softly lighted violet boudoir 
opening from one side, was the scene of a gathering so sociable,^ so 
easy and attractive, as to leave many a pleasant memory lingering 
afleiward for all who were admitted there. INIadame Zophee was 
oRen present, and Gilbert, save when hunting was long and late, 
never failed to appear. 

The week after they all arrived in town came the first great ball 
of the season, of which Bebe had spoken at tne croquet-party at St. 
Hilaire many weeks ago — the ball given by the young bachelors of 
the English and French clubs, partly as a sort of introduction to the 
general festivities, and partly in honor of Morton de St. Hilaire, who 
was, on that occasion, president of the committee for the last time. 

It was, also, partly in his honor, and to please them all,that IMadame 
Zophee yielded to the pressure of persuasion and accompanied the 
Princess' to this ball. She never appeared except twice at any scene 
of gayety at Pau. This was the first time, at the beginning of her 
story; and the second was — long after— near the end. 

Gilbert had scarcely expected to see her. She had refused so often, 
and remained so firm, that he had left his aiml ’s drawing-room in 
ihe afternoon, where they were all assembled, and had gone out, 


THE SUIs'-MAID. 


124 

much disappointed and somewhat disconsolate, to wander about the 
streets, feeling that he did dislike his town life, after all; and that 
the prospects of a ball —and, in fact, a round of balls — with a crowd 
of strangers, prorhised little interest to him. Thus it was a pleasant 
surprise to him, when waiting at the cloak-room door to conduct his 
aunt to her seat, to see the Princess emerge from the room and 
pass near him, Madame Zophee w^alking by her side. Close behind 
the princess came the baronne, wdio had arrived a few evenings be- 
fore, to take up her accustomed post for the winter. Ah! do we not 
all know her?— her bright smile, and twinkling eyes, and genial, 
kindly character. 

Ah! how difficult to wrife on a page like this of scenes we know 
so well, and of those Tve love and remember, who have known these 
scenes along with us; and yet without them Pau would be itself no 
more. 

Gilbert started forward as this party approached, for they had not 
observed him, and were passing along. “ Good-evening!” he 
said. 

Ah, good-evening, Sir Gilbert!” the Princess said, as he bowed 
low and paused when she turned to him. ” So we have succeeded, 
after all, you see; w^e have brought her.” 

“ Yes, here 1 am,” said Madame Zophee, looking up at him with 
a sweet but rather saddened smile. ” Here 1 am; and 1 feel a great 
babarian, 1 assure you — not at all at home, and not in the least suited 
for so gay a scene. 

“ Y^'ou^twA: very much suited to it, at all events,” said Gilbert, and 
an expression of admiration crept irrepressibly into his frank gaze, 
for indeed she did look lovely — lovely in her own peculiar and un- 
common way; lovely with that harmony of soft shade and unusual 
coloring that were so entirely her own. Her dress, made of some 
pliant material, was of ivory hue; soft and indescribable, as he felt 
it, in tone and color, it was marvelously becoming to the blanc-mat 
of her clear skin. From under their shadowy lashes her dark, 
dreamy eyes shone with an intense luster that reflected the glow' of 
brilliant light in which she stood. She wore rich, curious ornaments 
of dim woven gold coiled in her dusky hair, in plain, broad bands 
clasped round her neck, inclosing her long, flowing dress at the 
waist, and encircling her white arms. She looked as lovely, as curi- 
ous, as unlike any one else as usual. ” The Sun-maid ” spoke in 
the lustrous expression of her eyes; but you thought of Tsiganie as 
you noted the ornaments, simple and strange-looking, and yet so rich 
and costly, and as you recognized the curious taste that had directed 
the whole attire. It was very captivating, at all events, and she 
looked charming. 

“ ‘ Ho dress ’ was the last excuse made; but we repudiated that 
difficulty. Do you not think we were right?” asked the Princess, 
smiling triumphantly as she turned from Gilbert to take the arm of 
the old Due de Montitero, who was waiting to conduct her. 

” 1 think so, indeed. What a pretty costume!” he said. ‘‘ 1 wish 
1 could accompany you into the ball-room, but 1 am waiting for my 
aunt. JMorton and the marquis have gone off to do the honors at th^ 
entrance-door — to receive people, you know'. But, ah! 1 declare, 


THE SUK-MAID. 125 

here she is! and, hurra! that is capital— Comte de Beaulieu has 
taken possession of her, and now 1 maj’’ escort you in.’’ 

“ 3Iy dear Gilbert,” the marquise was just beginning to say, “ 1 

have kept you waiting ’ ’ but she had no time for more. The 

Comte de Beaulieu rushed forward to protrude a chivalrous arm, 
and Gilbert, nodding with a contented smile at her desertion, gave 
his to Madame Zophee; and they all went on through the crowd 
together. 

And a dense crowd it was ! This was going to be a great season 
at Pau. People had gathered en masse from all points of the com- 
pass — from all corners of the earth. There was every one of our old 
friends there, from the baron, resplendent in white waistcoat, with 
hair brushed straight on end, to Captain Hanleigh, of the Heavies, in 
the orthodox dress of the evening — the scarlet of the Pau hunt. 
There was little Jeanne de Veuil, blushing and blissful as usual, 
carrying a snowy bouquet much larger than her own head, already 
sauntenng through the glittering assembly, clinging to Morton’s 
arm, and waiting for their first of many valses to begin. Morton 
had deserted all his duties as a committee-man, and had resigned 
himself to happiness and to little Jeanne, in utter disregard of the 
rosette at his button -hole, and all the responsibility it implied. 

And there was Bebe, also in scarlet coat and with decorations both 
of gay rosette and stephanotis, appropriating Miss Netley in cool de- 
fiance of all comers from this side the Atlantic or the other. And as 
Gilbert, with Madame Zophee, followed the Princess and his aunt 
slowly up the brilliant, crowded room, he heard Bebe, with his 
usual nonchalance, announce that ” it wasn’t any good any fellows 
trying it on, for nearly all Miss Netley’s valses and the cotillon were 
promised to him; only,” exclaimed Bebe touching Gilbert on the 
shoulder, as the pressure of the crowd stopped him near them — 
‘‘ only she has kept one waltz for one fellow, and 1 say, Erie, that is 
you; so you must come and claim it. 1 said I’d tell you. She says 
she must have a spin with you, because you rode that gra}"^ of St. 
Hilaire’s so splendidly to hounds. So you are in luck, my boy.” 

‘‘ 1 am honored,” said Gilbert. ” All right Bebe, but wait a bit; 
1 will come back again. Dance!” he continued to Madame Zophee 
as they went on. ” Waltz in this crowd! It is not my line, cer- 
tainly; 1 do not feel much like it.” 

“ Oh, of course j'ou will dance! Everybody does here; you have 
only got to begin. Sir Gilbert.” 

” Will you dance with me, then?” he said. 

“ 1? No; it is certainly not in my line.” 

“ Then 1 will not dance at all,” he continued. “ It certainly is 
not in mine. Ah! i» this w^here you are goflbg to sit— all of you, 
everybody, in a row?” 

“ The thrones of State,” said Madame Zophee, laughing, as they 
paused a little behind his aunt and the. Princess; they had joined a 
group of French ladies round Madame la Prefete, and were all say- 
ing civil things to each other, with many bows and gesticulations, 
before they sat down. 

Just beyond them, at the head of the long room, was a row of 
large chairs and sofas reserved for the lady chaperones of various 
rank and degree. Festooned flags, clusters of evergreens, folds of 


126 


THE SUN-MAID. 


colored muslin, hung above their heads and adorned the walls on all 
sides around them; and a cleverly devised impromptu orchestra, 
covered with green foliage and bright bunches of flowers, hid old 
Kunst and his staff of assistant musicians at one end. 

The variety and internationalism of the mingling crowd were as 
curious here as at the meet of the tox-hounds. Soft-eyed Spaniards 
and sparkling Frenchwomen were there in abundance. Plenty of 
bright-cheeked girls from Irish and English homes stood in pretty, 
vari-colored groups round their mothers and chaperones — all busy 
filling up their cards of engagements with danseiirs of every possible 
race. There \vere many keen -faced Americans — men whose quick 
wits and ready speech lighted up the versatile conversation of that 
pleasant society as much as the showy beauty of the ladies of their 
nation and their costumes from Worth and Laf err iere astonished and 
adorned it. A wondeiful biilliancy and variety of coloring char- 
acterized the scene, for even the usual somber dressing of the gentle- 
men was this evening exchanged for the red hunting-coat. 

The floor was perfect, for dancing was a serious business at Pau, 
the affair of the moment; and every one danced — no one could help 
it, indeed— for while Kunst chose to play to them it was quite im- 
possible to stand still. 

This well-known and most distinguished personage was pausing 
at that moment and peering over the crowd, his gray head and bright, 
hawk-like eyes visible above the edge of his green inclosure. He 
was waiting for the arrival of the gi*eat ladies, and watching till 
they were ready, for the ball seriously to begin; and accordingly in 
a few minutes, the Princess moved with the "Due de Renada to the 
head of the room. A buzz of arrangement took place ; a rushing 
for partners; some scrambling for ^is-d-ms and places; and then 
Kunst struck the chords of his opening bar with encouraging vehe- 
mence, and dashed with rousing energy into the strains of “La 
Belle Helene.” With much dignity in some directions, and with 
very considerable hilarity in others, the quadrille was immediately 
started, and the first ball of the season began. 

Gilbert watched the dance forming, and then took a seat which a 
lady had left vacant by Madame Zophee’s side. 

“You naughty boy!” called his aunt to him, shaking her fan. 
“ As usual, lazy, lazy, you prefer to sit still.” 

“ Certainly 1 do, at present,” he sairl, laughing, “ unless you will 
dance with me, ma tante,” he added, saucily, using the native de- 
signation for her, quoted from sundry young French nephews of her 
husband, whose repeated and infantine reiteration of the term al- 
ways amused him enormously. 

“ Nonsense,” she •aid. “ Lazy boy!” 

“That is very jolly music, though,” he exclaimed, presently. 
“ One can scarcely sit still.” 

“Isn’t it?” said Madame Zophee. “ Why do you not dance, 
then?” 

“ 1 would if,” he replied hesitatingly, “ 1 knew how to make you 
dance with me.” 

“ Ah, you will not find that secret out easily,” she said, laughing. 

“ Yes, 1 will,” he answered. “1 am just thinking how 1 am to 


THE SUN- MAID. 12? 

manage. Never mind, by and by— wait a while. Before the even- 
ing is over, you shall see I will succeed.” 

“I should be very much surprised to see it,” she said again, 
laughing at his resolute face. You are a very determined young 
personage. Sir Gilbert, but it is impossible even for you. 1 assure 
you 1 have not danced for years. ” 

“ And 1 have danced about once a year ever since 1 was sixteen,” 
said Gilbert, ” at the county ball, you know. It comes off in the 
town near us, and they always put me on the committee, so I am 
bound to go. But 1 have learnea to dance, though, 1 can tell you, 
jMadame Zophee : you need not utterly doubt my powers. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ 1 do not doubt them in the least ; on the contrary, I am longing 
to see them exercised. 1 wish you would engage some one for the 
next waltz.” 

” Only you,” he said, calmly. “ With any strange young lady 1 
should be afraid. Y’ou see, 1 am not great at the accomplishment — 
not so much at home at it as on the hunting-field. 1 never really 
had any teacher but one little cousin, who came for Christmas to 
Erie’s Lynn once; she taught me; and, by the bye, my mother, in 
consequence of our unseemly and frivolous performances, never 
would ask her again. Ah, the quadrille is over; 1 must give up my 
seat.” 

Very reluctantly he had, indeed, to give it up; for back came a 
whole bevy of ladies, whose years did absolutely exclude them from 
any achievement more energetic than a quadrille. They all sat down 
in a long row, now closing in Madame Zophee, who was one seat 
behind them; and Gilbert, after standing disconsolate for a few 
minutes, looking from side to side, was obliged to move away. 

Then the ball went on with full vigor; and save from the infinite 
varieties of national characteristics in dancing, in dress, in tongue, 
it was much like any other ball up to a certain point. One swing- 
ing, undulating valse, perfectly played and splendidly danced, fol- 
lowed another, mazurkas breaking the routine with variety here and 
there — mazurkas which in England we are apt to think a dull dance, 
until we have seen one danced by Spaniards, Russians, Poles, or 
Americans at Pau; by the Marquis de Sotonaga dancing with Miss 
Nadine Scruga, perhaps, to the music of the ‘‘ Lilian,” played by 
Kunst; after which we realize what the grace, the verve, the swing, 
and altogether the fascination of the mazurka can be, and we never 
think it dull again! Occasional quadrilles came too, danced — even 
they — with a certain cheerful piquancy of performance which we 
learn there can be rendered the characteristic even of a quadrille ! 
And the ball went on thus, with all these successive changes of 
floating valses, rousing mazurkas, and vigorous quadrilles, until the 
climax came, when, with a renewed glow of energy, enthusiasm, 
and excitement, every one rushed to find seats for the cotillon. 

“ What on earth are they all about?” exclaimed Gilbert, in aston- 
ishment. 

He had been leaning, not in the best of spirits all this time, against 
a midway door that led from the dancing to the tea room. He could 
not get near Madame Zophee. Morton and Jeanne, Bebe and Miss 
Netley, and many other of his usual companions seemed quite ab- 
sorbed With each other, and he had found himself rather desolate 


THE SUN- MAID. 


128 

after a while; for he still persisted in his resolution against dancing, 
and everybody else seemed to think there was for the moment noth- 
ing else to'be done. The supper-room had [been opened at last, and 
he had tried to reach Madame Zophee, but, to his horror, she was 
seized by Baron Keffel, and carried off. Then he had looked for 
his aunt, and found her only in time to see her led away in proces- 
sion, after the Princess, by Le Comte de Beaulieu. He had then 
just escaped being introduced by his uncle to a middle-aged 
“ madame ” who spoke no English, but who, by virtue of his baron- 
etage, the committee thought might be properly allotted to hirn; 
he just escaped this, and his uncle took her himself, forgetful of his 
own destined portion— -an elderly comtesse, who happily, however, 
at the moment was performing wonders of agility with a Polish offi- 
cer in a galop. Then Gilbert had wandered alone into the supper- 
room, obliged to content himself with assisting the baron’s attentions 
to Madame Zophee on the other side, and later he followed them 
back again, and remained leaning against the doorway during the 
last few dances before people arranged themselves for the cotillon. 
Here he, however, had not been quite alone; he had made an ac- 
quaintance. As the crowd returned in troops from the supper- 
room, and rusned again, couple after couple, madly into the festive 
fray; and as Gilbert had stood up to let one after another pass him, 
he heard himself addressed by somebody close at his side— addressed 
in courteous and mellow tones. He turned to find an elderly En- 
glishman— a fresh, rosy-cheeked, blooming, and most dignified per- 
sonage, in snowy choker and extensive waistcoat — bowing gravely 
to him, and uttering his name. 

“ 8ir Gilbert Erie, 1 believe.” 

Gilbert, a little astonished, made his obeisance in return. 

“You seem a stranger, sir?” said the old gentleman, in distinct, 
clear-cut accents. “You seem a stranger. Sir Gilbert, in this gay 
crowd?” 

“ And 1 am a stranger, sir, to a certain extent.” 

The gentleman answered with a polite smile. “ But surely you 
remain so only by choice? A few words of introduction would, I 
have no doubt, make Sir Gilbert Erie an accepted and favored part- 
ner of the fairest danseuse in the room. Do you wish to dance, sir? 
1 know every one. Will you allow me to present you to a partner 
for this valse they are beginning now?” 

“ Thank you, no. You are very kind; but 1 am not a dancer. I 
know a few partners, if I wished to perform. It is very tempting, 
certainly, but this evening I do not think I shall join. I am quite 
sufficiently amused for one occasion in looking on.” 

“ Ah, then, let me be your cicerone to an acquaintance with our 
society generally. At all events, by sight and name 1 know every 
one; but, with your permission, sir, let me first present myself.” 
And the old gentleman bowed with extreme dignity, and Gilbert re- 
turned the salutation again y/ith perfect gravity and much inward 
amusement, as he continued; ” IMr. Autrobus Jeffereys, sir, at your 
service,” he said, solemnly. “'The oldest English inhabitant of the 
town of Pau. 1 have been thirty-twOb resident here. I know 
every creature in the place. ’ ’ 

“Ah, really, 1 am delighted to make your acquaiJl^ance,” said 


ME SUN-MAID. 


129 


'Gilbert, obeying bis usual impulse, and bolding out bis band. “ In 
fact, it is capital. I was just wondering wbo everybody was ; will 
you really tell me? Wbo is that young lady in green, for instance? 
X bave been trying to make out ber nationality for tbe last ten min- 
utes, and 1 cannot; for every time she passes me, it is witb a fresh 
partner, and she is talking a different tongue.” 

Ab!” responded Mr. Jeffereys, putting up bis eyeglass with 
much importance. ” Now, yes, 1 can just tell you; that is — ” and 
then be went on. 


He told Gilbert everything about them -all. In ten minutes be 
was conversant witb nearly every C7^ dit and witb the entire clironique 
scandaleuse of tbe place. He had his curiosity satisfied on tbe 
biography of everybody sufficiently remarkable to attract bis atten- 
tion, and of a great many others besides. He had pointed out to 
him, with much disapproval in tbe description, the ” rapids ” of the 
American set — men whose pale faces and keen, excitable eyes spoke 
of many late nights and much money dropped over baccarat at tbe 
club. , , 

Tbe frisky matrons were delicately indicated, from pretty Mrs. 
Honningsby, wbo, witb ber golden locks and natural-looking roses, 
was flirting with tbe Count de Ferre, to the beautiful Madame de 
Tesni and tbe handsome and dangerous Mi’S. Pbilistaire. 

The amount of Miss Netley’s fortune, witb Bebe’s chances of ac- 
quiring it, were calculated to a nicety for him; and so were the 
probabilities of tbe length and limits to which “ that fast and very 
doubtful little woman,” Madame Aronal, did or did not go. 

Then Madame de Questonali was pointed out to him, with ber 
.bevy of very charming daughters, whom “be really ought to 
know;” and Lord Lidscombe, who, witb tbe Earl of Errcscourt, 
made up, with their respective families, the valuable contributions 
which tbe British peerage had made that year to Pau. 


The Ladies Courtleigh were “ handsome, aristocratic, cold-look- 
ing,” Mr. Jeffereys said; but “the Honorable Miss Coninghams, 
that snowy flock who had floated in behind Lady Lidscombe, did 
justice, in beauty and in that air distingue you would have expected 
of them, to the noble Irish line from which they sprung.” And so 
Mr. Jeffereys went on; and Gilbert became acquainted with as 
much of the vices and virtue, attractions and demeritB,_of Pau so- 
ciety as had still been left unrevealed to him after that dinner at St. 

Hilaire. , «« -t 

“A lot of very nice people, no doubt, as he soliloquized, if 

they did not go on so oddly about each other!” 

Mr. Jeffereys amused him ex<;remely;^ and there they were still 
standing together, when Kunst paused in his performance, peered 
once more over his green inclosure, and watched while the rush and 
scramble indicative of the colill on began. 

“ What on earth are they al doing?” repeated Gilbert. 

“ Ah, they are going to r?aiice the cotillon now.” 

“ The cotillon 1 Dance it on chairs! How odd! Why, they are 

all silting down,.” „ _ , ... 

“ Of course. What! have you never seen one? Oh, i^ou will 
understand it directly. See, Mr. Huntley, the American, is gomg 


130 THE SUK-MAID. 

to lead— ah, with handsome Mrs. Yere. That is it; now they are 
off.” 

“ TVhat an odd dance!” repeated Gilbert, still looking on with 
astonishment as the whole assembly ranged themselves with wonder- 
ful dexterit}" in a huge double oval round the room. 

Ladies and gentlemen all sat together, each next the partner of 
their most particular choice; Kunst, with his green orchestra, filled 
up one end, the other being left open in front of “ the thrones of 
State,” as Madame Zophee had called them, where sat the Princess 
and Madame de Frontignac, Lady Lidscombe, Lady Errescourt, 
Madame de St. Hilaire, and many other distinguished personages 
besides. Just behind the Princess, Gilbert could still see Madame 
Zophee’s quiet face, her eyes sparkling with eagerness and amuse- 
ment as she talked over the Princess’ shoulder, and watched the 
gay scene. Kunst struck up the dear old tune, that quaint rococo 
air peculiar to himself, to which, it always seems to us, our grand- 
mothers may have danced their prim cotillons in the old dignified 
days. Round the room in a smooth, switt valse spin the leaders for 
a moment; then they pause; a few rapid signals pass, which all the 
clever and the initiated understand : one chosen lady after another 
rises and glides quickly to her place; danseurs are fast elected for 
each expectant post. The figure is formed ; they join hands, dance 
round, change partners and places, and return again, with a curious 
swimming movement, in time to the continuous valse music, that is 
very graceful and peculiar. All the national characteristics then 
come curiously out. The Spanish girls dance with a graceful float- 
ing abandon of movement that recalls the bolero and mandola of 
their Southern land. The English girls, just transplanted to this 
world of sunshine and cotillons, glide stiffly round with much diffi- 
dence and with some little awkwardness, that will soon wear away. 
They require coaching to-night from their leaders, and assistance 
from their partners and friends, but — they enjoy it. The cotillon, 
danced here in all its perfection, is to them as fascinating and de- 
lightful as it is new. The Americans throw themselves into it with 
admirable verve and energy ; and the pretty piquant French girls, 
with little Jeanne and her bright-eyed sisters among them, valse and 
poussette and do pas de basque and chasser swifty, daintily to and fro 
with a grace and coquetry that are bewitching. 

On went the cotillon: an infinite variety of figures came, and it 
must be told of Gilbert, that even he was fired with the fever of 
action, and longed to join in with them all. The fascination came 
on very gradually, in steady, irresistible degrees. He had stood, 
laughing, in ecstasies of amrrsement and enjoyment through the 
pretty scarf figure, the kneding quadrille, and the moulin; but it 
was the rosette figure and Miss Tetley that finally set him agoing. 

” 1 can’t abide him anymore, standing sulking against that door,’" 
the young lady had said to Bebe in the course of the evening, add- 
ing, “ Wait a bit; I’ll have him spinning around before long.” 

And she had tried accordingly, fii^t inviting him to walk round 
with her and Bebe, and be a flower, oi '''"horse, or something, and so 
be guessed by any young lady to whom sli^- nl eased to conduct him- 
but he had resisted this. Then she had held out Pretty gloved 
hand m invitation to him to be her conductor through ^hti iyiysteries 


THE SUN-MAID. 


131 

of the ladies’ chain, but he had shaken his head, and she had stamped 
her foot with irritation as she turned away ; but at last, as she knew 
beforehand, her moment came. 

“ What are they going to do with all those ribbons?” he asked 
ms faithful companion, Mr. Jelfereys, as, after making way for 
<;louds of many-colored scarfs, for flags, toys, and other implements 
of mysterious purpose, to be carried forward and back again, they 
had to turn round once more, and admit Bebe, bearing aloft a huge, 
gayly decoratedp open basket filled high with rosettes of ribbon of 
'every possible hue. What are they going to do with these now?” 
he said. 

“You will soon see,” said Mr Jeflfereys. 

“ What! distribute them among the ladies? Yes, by Jove, 1 de- 
clare!” and he paused and laughed aloud again with amusement and 
astonishment. The dajiseurs remained for a moment still, and the 
ladies — from pretty blushing Jeanne, who tripped shyly across to 
Morton, to the inevitable and irrepressible Miss Netley, who came 
straight over to Gilbert— each went up to the gentleman of her se- 
lection, pinned the rosette on his shoulder, and claimed him her 
partoer in the dance. In two minutes the floor was once more cov- 
ered with swimming couples, and Kunst’s music burst forth above 
their heads with renewed vigor, in a peal of delieious and irresistable 
strain. 

■“ Come along,” said Miss Netley, as Gilbert started back dis- 
mayed. “ Yes, you are in for it now. Come, you cannot say no — 
«can he, Mr. Jeftiereys? Come you along; never fear, 1 will get you 
around, ” 

And so certainly she did. 

“ Come along, then,” said Gilbert, “ 1 suppose 1 am in for it; 
shut your eyes and ride hard. ” 

Little Cousin Anneste’s teaching came faithfully and invaluably 
to his recollection then. He encircled his determined little partner 
firmly; he caught the echo of that floating music; he found his 
balance in a moment, his foot as steady as his ear was true. He 
was just conscious of the amused smile in Madame Zophee’s eyes as 
they passed her, and of the ring of the American girl’s voice as she 
said, “Capital! here we go!” and then up came to his assistance 
all the courage of a rider accustomed to five-barred gates and to 
sunk fences, and away they went, and he enjoyed it. Miss Netley 
was a famous partner. The pace was tremendous, and on a rush 
ing American deuxtemps they got splendidly round. He was soiTy, 
in fact, when the clapping of the leader’s hands resounding through 
the room told them that they must stop, for their turn was over. 
She let go his hand, touched him lightly on the shoulder, and 
brought him dexterously up with a last swing just in front of Bebe 
who stood expectant at her own chair. Gilbert must find his way 
back again across the room to Mr. Jeffereys by himself. 

“ Must we stop? Must 1 go?” he said, as she sat down. “lam 
sorry. ” 

“Yes, you must; but— that is right; never mind!” said Miss 
Netley. “ We shall have another turn. I’ll give you another bow.” 

And so she did, in spite of Bebe’s remonstrance, and they went 
off in that flying deuxtemps once more. Then others followed her 


THE SUN-MAID. 


132 

example, seeing that Gilbert, after all, did not refuse to dance. 
Jeanne’s sister came up with a blush and a pretty smile, her head 
turned with a pretended coyness on one side ^ she held up her 
rosette, and he went ofi with her — delighted again. And then the 
Comtesse de Beaulieu’s young married daughter chose him, and one 
after another all his fair friends from the hills, till he was gayly 
decorated with many a bright-colored bow all over his coat-flaps, 
and was very pleased with them too. Finally little Jeanne herself 
came, Morton bringing her and sticking on the rosette unceremoni- 
ously for her upon Gilbert’s coat, which she was much too shy to 
do for herself, and then they too had a charming valse, while Mor- 
ton waited, looking on with much approval, until Gilbert brought 
back his little “ lady of the bright eyes,” and he appropriated her 
for himself again. And through it all Gilbert’s spirits rose, and his 
cheeks flushed, and his eyes sparkled, and he thought to himself 
decidedly “ that a ball, and, above all, a cotillon, was a very jolly 
thing.” 

Then the scene changed. The ladies sat down. The gentlemen 
looked impatiently round. What was coming? The last figure, 
and the prettiest and most graceful, surely, of all. Gilbert had ta 
make way again, having been put by his last partner into the only 
corner left, for him-r-his door-way. He had to make way, for in 
came the attendants once more bearing not one but many baskets, 
all filled to overflowing with lovely, sweet scented flowers. The 
gentlemen rushed at them, but the leader waved them back. The 
bouquets were carried round and distributed, every danseur securing 
as many as he possibly could, and the room became suddenly filled 
and permeated with the delicious scent. Parma violets, snowy 
hothouse lilacs, roses, stephanotis, gardenias, were carried and dis- 
tributed into every corner; and Gilbert looked on an instant, won- 
dering, delighted, surprised. Then, as the baskets passed them he 
suddenly realized the position of things: the use and destiny of those 
lovely bouquets became apparent to him. Morton was proffering his 
with a bright smile, to ‘Jeanne, and she had taken it, touched her 
rosy lips to the flowers in reply to his glance, and they were valsing 
round merrily together, while Gilbert stood astonished still. Bebe 
had proffered his on bended knee to Miss Netley; Captain Hanleigh 
was struggling across the room to lay his at the feet of the English 
heiress, Miss Carlisle; and every cavalier had rushed with his fra- 
grant offering to secure fimt the special lady of his love. In two 
minutes once again the floor was crowded, all were valsing swiftly 
round, each lady bearing aloft, proud and delighted, her lovely trophy 
of flowers. 

“ Ah!” exclaimed Gilbert to himself, with a sudden long-drawn: 
breath, as the position broke upon him. ‘ ‘ Ah ! now — hurra I I un- 
derstand!” and he sprung forward, rushed to the nearest basket he 
could get hold of, and claimed a bouquet in his turn, 

“ Oh, you do want one? Yes— certainly,” said the leader, who 
stood near. “ 1 beg your pardon, I thought you were not dancing. 
Here is a beauty — about the best of the lot.” 

‘‘ Thanks,” said Gilbert, and he turned away with his treasure, a 
little glance of triumph sparkling in his eyes and his color deeptm- 
ing as he bent over it for a moment, and paused. Then he looked 


THE SUN-MAID. 


133 


round. Everybody was dancing; the room was quite crowded, but 
little he cared. He plunged right into the middle of the vortex, 
canoned violently against Bebe and Miss Hetley, and rebounded 
hard against Monsieur de Veuil, who, with mouth wide open and 
hair on end, was making some stout lady dance. On went Gilbert, 
disregarding all exclamations, and made his w'ay straight to Madame 
Zophee’s seat. He held out his bouquet ; she was still in her place 
behind the Princess, who smiled and turned, amused, to her, as 
Gilbert stood and waited, his bouquet still extended in his hand. 
Madame Zophee shook her head. 

“ You must,” he said, determinedly. “You cannot help it now 
— you must.” 

“ Ah, no. Sir Gilbert. Thank you, I never dance. 

“ But 1 never do either, and 1 had to, as you saw. So come; you 


must, you know you must. ’ ’ 

“ No, no, I cannot!” she repeated. 

But her eyes softened and looked wistfully at him as he stood 
pleading there. She was very young still — poor little Zophee and 
the music and the gay scene, and the crowd of dancers floating past 
her had made her pulses beat and her cheek glow for the last hour. 
She loved dancing, as Southerners do love it. She had danced 
through many a day of that far-away past, as they dance in the 
Sun-lands, as they dance among the Sun-maids, as her mother and 
her grandmother had danced, perhaps, before her, with the old wild 
race, with the Tsiganie; and her eyes softened and sparkled brightly 
again as she tried to say, “ No, no, I cannot,” once more. 

“ Ah, but you must!” said the Princess, at last, turning to her 
with her gentle, persuasive way. ‘ ‘ Y^ou must ! ’ ’ she repeated again, 
laying her hand upon Zophee’s, and speaking, as she always did to 
her in winning tones of tenderness, gently combining entreaty with 
soft but irresistible command. “In the cotillon you must when 
you have a bouquet, you know, Zophee; you cannot refuse. 

“Ah me!” said Zophee, murmuring softly to herself m Kussian. 
“ Ah rne» Have I no strength of resistance? Why did I come to 
a ball? That music! Sir Gilbert, I thank you, you are so kind. 
Must I, then? Well, just one turn.” , ^ 

She rose, and the Princess made room for her, and she came out 
to him, and he placed the bouquet in her hand. 

“1 am suie you can dance, dear,” said the Princess, as she 
paused, hesitating a moment by Gilbert’s side. “ 1 am sure you 
will valse to perfection.” 

‘ ‘ Dance !” said Madame Zophee, with sparkling eyes. Why do 
you make me? You forget 1 am a Tsiganie. 

‘ ‘ At all events, I can keep time, said Gilbert, and that is 
about all,” he added; and then he encircled her gold-spanned waist, 
and she put her hand lighted upon his shoulder, and Metra s La 
Rose ” came floating softly from behind the green orchestra, and 
almost before he was aware of it they had begun. 

“ Wonderfully folly!” was Gilbert’s descriptive epithet, which he 
had applied in inward soliloquy to all the former dances of this 
evening and, but for this dance, would probably have been al- 
ways Ins commentary on, and impression of, valsing in general, as 
he merrily joined it, and went rushing round. But while valsing. 


THE SUN-MAID. 


IM 

taking widely, is a pleasant pastime or an active exercise, there are 
some valses, danced here and there, which remain lingering upon 
the memory like a lovely poem. And so it seemed to Gilbert, as 
now he did not rush off vehemently, as he had done before, carrying 
his partner vigorously along with him with energetic action strongly 
contradictory to the poetry of “ La Rose;” but he seemed to pause 
as he encircled Madame Zophee’s waist, and then sJie floated away 
with him in a wonderful musical dreamland. He seemed earned 
away as they went smoothly, quietly, gliding over the room; she 
gently steadying and guiding him, by her hand lying so lightly yet 
so flrmly in its place; he supporting her, and yet entirely led by her, 
carried on by that curious, mesmeric power of a beautiful dancer — 
a power that made the strains of “ La Rose ” seem, then and ever 
after, to him as the echo of a delicious dream. 

“ You valse well, Sir Gilbert,” she said, as they paused after three 
times sweeping the round of the room. 

“ I never knew it before,” he answered. ‘ ‘ And you — ” 

“Ah! I — it is an old forgotten vice, my love of it. But dancing 
has always seemed the poetry of movement to me.” 

“ It is perfect. May we go on again?” 

■“ No— well, once more. The cotillon is over. 1 see the leader 
has himself started now. And everybody is rushing for one turn. 
Are you afraid? No? Come then; just once more round. ” . 

Once more just round the room they went, and she stopped him 
by the Princess’s side. 

“I could soon make you a charming valser,” she said, as ho 
turned to smile, with sparkling eyes, into her face. 

“ 1 wish you would!” he exclaimed, and she laughed in answer. 
Her cheeks were bright with her unwonted exertion, and her dark 
eyes were glistening with a wonderful brilliancy of life. She looked 
so young as she stood for a moment, all lighted up with that tran- 
sitory gleam, glowing with the warmth of her momentary self- 
abandonment to the bright, soft enjoyment of her lost 3 ’'outh. Gil- 
bert’s face reflected her look of happiness, his eyes glanced in a 
bright answer to hers. Suddenly she paled, and the cloud fell. 

“ 1 must not do it again!’’ she exclaimed, plaintively, clasping her 
hands with a passionate gesture. “ Why did 1 come? Why did 1 
do it, after 1 said I would never again?’’ 

She turned from him before he could answer her, and sunk back 
upon a vacant seat. 

“ Have I tired you too much?” he said. “ I am very sorry.’’ 

“ No, no!” and she gave him her left hand for an instant, as if to 
reassure him. “ It is not you; never mind; only do not ask me to 
do it — do not ask me again.” 

“ Why? why?” — the one eager word that rose ever to his lips as 
he talked to her. It came quivering to them again, but was crushed 
back in time — the one word he had forbidden himself. 

“ You are tired?” said the Princess, suddenly’' observing her. 
“You are tired, deai. You went very quick and long,” she added, 
turning to clasp her friend’s hand. “You are pale, Zophee; you 
are not accustomed, as we are, to the heat and the fatigue.” 

Gilbert stood up and looked round in perplexity for a moment. 
Was there anythine: he could do for her? He knew all her changeful 


THE SUN-MAID. 


135 

moods so well; often before, as they bad talked together, she had 
thus paled suddenly, and lost her self-control. His one thought 
was what he could do to quiet and soothe her now. 

As he turned, several Frenchmen drew near— Monsieur de Yar- 
mount, the Comte de Soier, come with the same question, all pursu- 
ing the same object. Madame Yariazinka had danced with “ Sare 
Geelbert;” would she not dance with them? This invasion seemed, 
curiously enough, to rouse Madame Zophee, and to restore to her her 
self-control. No, she would dance with none of them, she was tired, 
she was going home; and Gilbert stood by with a pleased feeling of 
triumphant superiority as, one by one, she waved them back from 
her, and turned at last wearily away. 

“ Do you really wish to go home?” he said, bending toward her, 
and speaking in low, earnest tones. 

“ 1 do, very much. 1 should never have come. Can 1 go away? 
See, the Princess has gone to dance. What can 1 do? Oh, I would 
go away! Oh, yes, I would go home, indeed, indeed, 1 would.” 

“Will you let me take you, then?” said Gilbert. “ To your car- 
riage, 1 mean. 1 will tell the Princess — 1 will say you were tired; I 
will tell her anything you like— but will you let me take you?” 

“ Do you think the carriage is there?" 

“ I am sure it is. 1 will go and see, if you like, Madame Zophee; 
but it would take so long coming back to you all up the room. Will 
you not come now? And while you put your cloak on I will call 
up your carriage.” 

“ Yery well; 1 should like to go,” she said; and she rose and took 
his aim. 

They threaded their way through the crowd, the excited flush of 
the dance having passed from both of them; their wonted quiet 
manner of intercourse having taken its place. He led her along si- 
lently, with a pleasant feeling thrilling him of appropriation of her 
— appropriation, as he told himself pleasingly, by her allowed. She 
acknowledged it among all that crowd as Ms part to cai-e for her, to 
lead her out as he had brought her into the room. His strange, 
sweet friend — he was full only of concern for her now, saddened in 
the midst of this gay scene, because her glance had saddened, sorry 
because her cheek had paled. 

“ 1 will look for Ivan and the carriage,” he said, as he left her at 
the cloak-room door; and then away he went out into the dark, still 
night, among the crowd of waiting carriages, to where the long row 
of horses were drawn up, all champing restlessly" at their bits, and 
he called for Ivan, but in vain. No Ivan replied, no Ivan was forth- 
coming, although again and again he sent emissaries, and called the 
name himself loudly along the line. No Ivan was there; some mis- 
take had occurred, evidently; Ivan’s orders had not been under- 
stood, and Gilbert came back to Madame Zophee in dismay. 

“ Not there? You do not say so! How extraordinary of Ivant 
And Yasilie, is he not among the servants in the Hall?” 

“ Neither of them. I have called up and down the whole line;, 
there is not a sign of them anywhere.” 

“ And I — I cannot get home!” exclaimed Madame Zophee, in de- 
spair, realizing suddenly the full force of the situation. 

‘ I am so sorry!” he repeated. “ What can be done? Will you 


THE SUH-MAED. 


156 

mind waiting? or will you liave some one else’s carriage? Let me 
see — of course I will call up my aunt's.” 

It is of no use, Sir Gilbert; it is only two o’clock, and 1 know 
hers was not ordered till half -past three. Monsieur Morton would 
not have it a moment earlier, and, ah me! 1 ordered mine at one — 
and it has not come for me. Vasilie mistook what 1 said to him. 
What is to be done?” 

“ Will you have some one else’s carriage?” he said. 

No, no! 1 cannot take away the carriage of somebody I do not 
know, or any one’s, indeed, without permission ; and they are all, 
all dancing stiil — what can I do? Sir Gilbert, go back, and do not 
mind me.” 

” As if 1 would,” he said, resolutely, with the dim consciousness 
within him that it was a very great deal pleasanter standing here, 
even in the cold and draughty entrance to the cloak-room, looking 
consolingly into Madame Zophee’s fair, quiet face, than it could pos- 
sibly be dancing in the ball-room with Miss Netley or any other 
laughing- eyed partner, of whatever clime. 

” Madame Zophee,” he said, presently, in his frank, straightfor- 
ward, matter-of-fact way, “ you really ought to go home. You do 
look tired. That delicious valse we had together was too much for 
you, and it was all my fault.” 

‘ ‘ It was not the valse. Sir Gilbert : no — do not say that. Bo not 
mind me — it is my way, you know; it is the old story,” she added, 
smiling up at him, but with a sad look in her eyes that contradicted 
the smile. “ It was not the valse, you know, but the thoughts that 
came with it; and now — yes, that and everything has made me very 
tired.” 

” If 1 could only get you home,” he continued, earnestly; “ would 
you come with me? Will you walk, 1 mean? It is such a little 
way, and it is such a glorious night. It is mild and delicious, and 
there is brilliant starlight; will you not walk?” 

“ Shall 1?” she said, eagerly. “ 1 should like so to get home.” 

“Come, then,” and he drew her hand within his arm. “Are 
you well wrapped up? Are you warm enough in your queer head- 
dress — are you quite sure? Come, then;” and she let him lead her 
out. 

Out from the heated, exciting ball-room they went — out on the 
terrace that led along to her hotel — out into the clear, beautiful, sil- 
ver radiance that lighted up the soft darkness of the night, and 
along the terrace they went, pausing a moment instinctively", uncon- 
sciously, to gaze, as they stood side by side, upon that wondrously 
bewitching view; to watch the clouds roll over the mountains, that 
rose away across the valley, looming in the mystic light, far, far 
away; to feel their hearts thrill, as they stood, silent and awe-struck, 
with the majesty of the mighty nature-world, before them, over- 
powering their souls in all its lofty and sublime composure, in its 
intense and stirring contrast to that scene of human life — fraught 
with excitement and frivolous vanity — in which they had mingled 
so unthinkingly, and from which they had come away. 

“ Let me go home,” said IVIadame Zophee, presently, and he led 
her across the terrace to her hotel — led her almost in" silence, and 
with scarcely another word. For he understood her changed mood; 


THE SUK-MAID. 


137 

his heart answered the deep thrill of sentiment, soul-stirring and 
passionately devotional, w^hich he knew that view, the mountains, 
the realized contrast, had awakened in her; and by word or look he 
would not disturb the saddened tranquillity of her spirit, for he un- 
derstood her — and was he not her tender, her considerate, and most 
chivalrous friend? 


CHAPTER XV. 

BAND-DAY IN THE BASSE PLANTE. 

A LITTLE of the lassitude of reaction hung about the whole party 
in the Rue de Lycee next day; not unnatural, certainly, after the 
unwonted excitement of the first ball. It was not a hunting-day, so 
there was nothing to make any one turn out earlier than he pleased* 
and after a late ^jeunervfiih. his aunt and cousin, Gilbert found the 
afternoon hours left upon his hands. It was his own fault, certain- 
ly. The marquise had innumerable visits to pay, and to perform 
this duty she w^armly invited Gilbert to accompany her, not feeling 
much astonishment, however, when he declined. Morton had made 
an important engagement with Jeanne, and he also expressed his de- 
sire that Gilbert sliould join the party at La Villette. But neither 
did this suggestion suit him. Indeed, as his aunt at last asserted, 
Gilbert was fidgety to-day. No suggestion seemed to fall in with 
his ideas, and his kind friends finally realized that they must leave 
him to dispose of himself. With this result he seemed satisfied. 

“ To tell the truth, aunt,” he elaborately explained, “ I have not 
half explored the town 3 ^et ; there are lots of interesting corners, I 
have no doubt, that I have still to see.” 

“ But — how?” exclaimed the marquis, looking severely at Mor- 
ton. “ Have you not been conducted — has Morton not had the po- 
liteness, my dear nephew, to be your guide? Certainly— certainly 
there are many most interesting objects for you to visit, and many 
scenes of famous historic association which, without fail, you must 
be conducted to see. ’ ’ 

” Oh, thank you, thank you a thousand times, uncle” exclaimed 
Gilbert, hastily, seized indeed with a sudden horror that the mar- 
quis might himself offer to be his cicerone for the afternoon. ” In- 
deed, we have done all that part of the sight-seeing thoroughly; 
have we not, Morton? We went into it in a regular business-like 
way 3 "esterday and the day before.” 

‘‘Yes; do not reproach me, father,” said Morton, ‘‘ for I have 
done my part. If Gilbert is not completely au fait with Jeanne 
d’Albret, Le bon Roi, Gabrielle d’Estrees, Bernadotte, and all the 
rest of it, it is not my fault. I have taken him ever^here. He 
has been all over the chateau, and he has seen the tortoise-shell cra- 
dle, and the trophy of fiags, and the statue, and everything; and I 
only hope that it lias all made a due impression upon his mind.” 

‘‘ 1 like everything about that jolly old fellow, Henri IV.,” said 
• Gilbert. ‘‘ Before I came here, indeed, I associated Pau and Bear^ 
nais chiefly with Morton and him.” 

‘‘Ah, then— that is well,” said the marquis, somewhat pacified,, 
and turning his attention to his luncheon again. 


THE SUH-MAID. 


138 


“ Have a glass of Juran^on, Gilbert/’ said Morton, “ for it is, after 
all, 1 think, about my pleasantest association with Hem; IV.” 

“ Do,” said the marquise, “ and give me a little, Morton, as well; 
it is so fortifying. Gilbert, fill up your glass.” 

” And think,” said Morton, solemnly, /* as you imbibe, of that 
imposing moment. Scene,” he went on with melodramatic pathos— 

Scene — The Tour de Mazere. Moment — the birthtime of Henri 
of Navarre. Present— The Infant, plus his grandfather and a bottle 
of Juran 9 on wine. Action — An ounce of garlic eaten by the royal 
stranger, and half a pint of the silvery liquid imbibed, to the aston- 
ishment of his attendants, the fortifying of his constitution, the sat- 
isfaction of his grandparent, and the future glory of France.” 

” What are you saying, Morton?” said the marquis, in an irritated 
tone, for he had only half followed the meaning of his son’s elo- 
quent rodomontade, and the levity of his tones displeased him. 
“You do talk a continual persiflage?” he continued. “ What do 
you say?” 

“ 1 am merely pursuing my instructions to my cousin,” JMorton 
continued, “ my causeries on the history of our capital of Bearn, 
and illustrating my discourse as 1 go along by practical experiments 
on the merits of Juran^on wine. But I have done, father. Gil* 
bert is not a hopeful pupil, so I have done. Farewell, everybody — 
a tantot, mon cousin— now I am oil to Jeanne.” 

Then they separated, and for the rest of the afternoon all went 
their respective ways, the marquise to paj’^ her visits, and lo spend 
some very pleasant hours in hearing often repealed the truly sincere 
expressions of her friends’ delight at ner return to town. 

The marquis repaired soon and successively to the two clubs, 
whiling away very agreeably the time, first in a local gossip, with 
sundry white-headed compatriots at the “ Cercle Henri,’’ below the 
theater, beyond Lafontaine’s shop; and then changing the scene into 
the English Club on the Place Royale, from the window of which 
admirable institution a most cheerful view of life could be taken any 
fine afternoon, and where much lively converse, and many good rub- 
bers of whist, and not a few excellent stories, might be enjoyed. 

Gilbert saw his aunt enter her carriage, taking his hat oft with a 
smile to her as he stood lingeiing on the doorstep; and she, kissing 
her finger tips and shaking her snowy curls at him, drove out of the 
court. Then he went on by himself. He had made no plan for 
his own occupation during the afternoon. He had no secret project 
in his mind, prompting his steady refusal of all suggestions for' his 
amusement from his friends. 

He was conscious merely of a wish to be left alone, a sort of dim 
idea that he would trust to fate rather than to project to bring 
something pleasant in his way. He was in a curious, tired, and 
dreamy frame of mind that suggested idleness, so he turned his 
footsteps along the Rue de Lycee, without any clear realization of 
where he wished or meant to go. He passed his own house, rejecting 
promptly a suggestion of conscience that he might very properly 
go up to his room and pass this idle afternoon in writing his home 
letters. An epistle to his mother was certainly due about this time, 
and a whole budget of business papers lay, unnoticed and unan- 


THE SUIf-MAID. 139' 

swered, on his table besides. But he was in no mood for them to- 
day. 

He turned the corner of the club, and came out upon the Place 
at last. It was about three o’clock, and a glorious winter day, and 
the Place, with its grand background of mountains rising at the far 
end in the distant view, looked a tempting lounging-place in which 
to smoke a quiet Manilla, and pass in pleasant dolce far niente an 
afternoon. 

There were very few people visible there at this hour of the day. 
Everybody was driving, riding, visiting each other, or still resting 
away fatigue. He wandered down the Place between the rows of 
leafless trees; he passed the gateway and walked just under the 
windows of the Hotel de France; and when he reached the parapet 
he leaned on it for a moment, looked across the valley, gazed at the 
mountain-tops without feeling that he saw them, and then he turned 
suddply round. He was facing the huge hotel now, on its south- 
ern side. ^ The range of windows oppQsite him looked every one of 
them straight over Gave and coteaux and the valleys toward the pics 
and mountain ranges in full face of the Spanish sun; and the stone 
balcony on rez-de-chaussee (that was, as he looked up, just on the 
level above his eyes) commanded, in the glory of the midday, or in 
the sweetness of the moonlight, the whole grand prospect of the 
Pyrenees. The two low French windows opening on to it, at the 
west corner close to him, stood wide open this afternoon, and by 
moving a little forward and raising himself to his full height he 
could see almost right in — quite sufBciently so, at all events, to real- 
ize that the room was empty. Madame Zophee was evidently not 
at home. 

“ Not a soul to be found!” he exclaimed to himself, in a vexed 
tone, at last. * ‘ There does not seem to me to be a creature awake in 
the whole place. Where has everybody gone to, 1 wonder? and 
what is to become of me? I do wonder where Madame Zophee is; 
gone out walking, 1 fancy; or, more likely, as it is just three 
o’clock, she has gone oif for a drive.” 

No use lingering there, at all events. There was, evidently, no 
chance of her appearing at the window, as he had half consciously 
been hoping that he should see her do. No use lingering there; 
there was no one to be seen. So he turned his footsteps westward 
along the terrace, lighting his cigar, and walking slowly, the grand 
view pleasing and the soft air soothing him unconsciously as he 
went, but his mind remaining still restless. His promenade, in all 
its solitude, did not promise him so much enjoyment as he had as- 
sured his aunt and Morton he should find therein. 

He passed along the boulevard and the terrace under the castle 
wall. He looked up at the old Tour de Mazere, and thought drow- 
sily of Margaret de Valois and Jeanne d’Albret, and Morton’s disser- 
tation upon the Juran^on wine; and then he wound round by the 
bastions into the lower ground, that had been once the garden of 
the castle in the grand old days of the Viscounts of Bearn. 

He came upon Triquetti’s graceful statue of Gaston Phoebus, 
Comte de Foix, and he stood puffing his cigar for some minutes 
here, admiring the agile-looking figure, the prmcelj’’, graceful post- 
ure, the eager, energetic face, and then suddenly, as he lingered. 


140 


THE SUN-MAID. 


music burst upon liis ear. He strolled on, and found himself pres- 
ently in the Basse Plante, on the fringe of a crowd of people, and 
in full view and hearing of a military band. 

“ Band-day at the Basse Plant e " it was indeed, and a scene of 
festivity he found there, quite unexpected. He had heard of the 
band-days on the Place Royale, and Morton’s and Bebe’s descrip- 
tion of that assembly of loveliness and fashion had made him a little 
bit curious and eager in anticipation for the first day to arrive. 
But nobody had told him of the music here; and the season soon 
revealed itself, as he lingered and criticised the crowd, observing 
immediately that of fashion and beauty there was none. 

The band-day in the Basse Plante, from some freak of fashion, 
like the Serpentine drive in Hyde Park, had ceased to be » ^ 

“ Nobody ” came to it— that is, “ nobody ” according to the lan- 
guage of the ball-rooms of Pau. No English, except nurses and 
children; no French or Americans of such as wore costumes of 
Felix and Laferriere. 

Yet the scene was both curious and picturesque. The company 
was chiefly native — of “ the people ” — almost alt bourgeois from the 
near neighborhood or from the town of Pau. There were crowds 
of neat, busy-looking women, stout mothers of families with groups 
of little quaintly-dressed children, brought out with them to hear 
the music, to dance in the sunshine, to lie about on the grass in 
happy idleness, and generally to enjoy themselves and make “ fdte.” 

All these good personages had set themselves down in circles, and 
sat packed close together, each resting her feet on the edge of her 
neighbor’s chair. Their husbands and husbands’ friends sat rouna 
and among them, looking very happy and sociable, smoking much 
potent tobacco, and holding much noisy discourse. The men 
smoked and chattered, and the women clicked their knitting-pins, 
and shouted often and vociferously to their mob-capped babies, who 
were prone persistently to stray far afield, and they and their sur- 
rounds altogether made a curious and lively picture. 

The chateau closed in the view on one side, and the park 
stretched away on the other, and here in the Basse Plante the tall 
leafless trees grew in stiff, piim rows, recalling ever the quaint taste 
that had laid out these pleasure-grounds, and the strange old scenes 
of its royal and early times. Across the tall stems fell the winter 
sunshine, deepening already to a ruddy glow as the early twilight 
orept on. The Basse Plante and the valley even at this hour were 
covered with the soft floating mist that heralded the darkness. 

Among the black-stemmed trees, glittering in the sun-rays, stood 
the circle of soldiers— their red pantaloons and blue frocks giving 
glow and color to the picture, and their brass instruments flashing 
back reflection of the light. And through the still, wintrj’' branches 
and the gathering mists rose sweet, stirring music, softened where 
Gilbert stood by a little distance, and waking exquisite thrills of 
recollection as the strains reached him, for it was the full floating 
echo, familiar and delicious, of Metra’s “ La Rose.” Like the rise 
and fall of the rhythm of a beautiful poem the strains reached him, 
bringing a flush of soft excitement to his cheek, and a glitter of un- 
wonted feeling to his eyes. He listened delighted, aand leaned for 
some time against a tree, smoking his cigarette, watching the 


THE SUH-MAID. 


141 


curious, briglit-colored crowd, and enjoying the soft stillness of the 
air as the sunlight glowed every instant to a richer and warmer hue 
and the shadows deepened under the tall- stemmed trees. 

Along the stiff alleys of the Basse Plante he could see the slowly 
moving figures of people sauntering to and fro in Ute-d-tHe a little 
away from the circle round the band. And, further still, far into the 
brown shadows of the park, he saw solitary figures dotted here and 
there; an unsociable man like himself appeared on one side, smoking 
a misanthropical cigar; a priest emerged from the sylvan shade, 
paced the avenue toward the chateau, and disappeared; one quaint, 
characteristic figure after another caught Gilbert’s attention and 
amused him. And so he stood for a long while, lingering and look- 
ing, and listening to the music there. 

Suddenly he sprung upright from his lounging position and 
gazed eagerly down one long row of trees. It was a stiff avenue, 
leaciing under the ramparts of the castle toward the entrance near 
the Haute Plante. The sun- glow was flooding there, scattering the 
silvery gathering mists on its way, and between the dark and tall- 
stemmed trees there was coming toward him some one he thought 
he knew. It was too far oft’ to recognize anything but the sweep of 
the dress, the step, the tournure of the figure, and the verve and 
grace and lightness of the walk; but still he sprung forward, for 
there was no mistaking these. It was Madame Zophee. She b'- ' 
got out of her carriage at the upper entrance to the Basse 
and had sent it away from there, and she was now w»^’ 
by herself through the trees, and the rich sunset, 
sweetness of the air. 

“Madame Zophee!” Gilbert exclaimed, and he* 
and flung his cigar away, as he drew near her. “ 
have found you, he went on. “1 have been r 
afternoon, and 1 have been so desolate and so bore 
“Alone and bored!” she said, in an amuser’ 
him her hand. “ Where are all your friends 
have they deserted you?” 

“ It was my own fault,” he said. “ I was * 
eon, and would not do anything that was su 
“ How very unpleasant of you!” 

“ Was it not? But the fact is, I knew 
and I could not quite discover what it '' 
he added, with a bright, pleased smik 
“Well?” she answered, looking* 
nothing more. “Well, and wbe.t 
She paused for his reply before 
“ Take a walk in the park 
round by her side. “ Tha^ ' 
sibly have conceived fo’* 
brought it in my wav 
She laughed men- 
path. 

“ Ha, ha!” s' 
quickly. Sir r 
going straig 
“ But - 


142 


THE SUN-MAID. 


Will you not be my guide? 1 have never yet explored the park, and 
it is such a lovely evening. Ah! will you not come?” 

“ Impossible,” she said, decidedly. ” It is lovely. Sir Gilbert; 
but, unfortunately, it is just the loveliness that constitutes the im- 
possibility. This is at once, as you will soon find out here, the most 
picturesque and most dangerous hour of the day.” 

“ But why? Ah, do not go homeward. Look, the sun is not 
nearly set.” 

“ But in a few moments it will be, and then — 1 must he at home. 
See that beautiful effect among the trees and over the valley there, 
of the struggle between mist and sunlight, day and darkness, heat 
and chill. In half an hour the chill will have conquered, and all this 
glow will be gone. I must go at once, Sir Gilbert; but do not let 
me interrupt your walk, do not let me take you away from the 
music, from this gay scene.” 

“ 1 am tired of it,” he said, very tired of it all by myself h6re. 
May I not accompany you to the hotel?” 

” Well, then, if you are so kind; it is not very far,” she said, 
“ and it will not take you out of your way.” 

And then they turned together eastward, toward the chateau and 
ficross the bridge. 

was very delicious to stroll quietly on, to saunter through that 
weet air, in view of that glorious prospect, along that quaint, 
beneath the shadow of these stern old walls. Pleasant 
uresqueness of the situation, to feel its influence un- 
Gilbert did, as they went on, and as he looked up to 
't of the Tour de Gaston, still glowing in the ruddy 
uit finely drawn against the winter sky, as he watched 
'ing down the mountain-side, and the pies still stand- 
"ud clear. A soft rose-flush glowed on the snowy 
le Bigorre and d’Ossau, and little fleecy clouds 
nd purple hue curled round their summits, or 
?ross the deepening skies. The mist lay dense 
a the hot earth in the valley now, heralding 
and chasing upward the bright hues of the 
^emed falling round them, soft and tranquil 
•’it and hushing almost to a murmur, as 
-swering tones. Under the ramparts of 
•^ay, then on past the new Hotel Gas- 
"artin, and along the terrace, until 
ce Royale again, and were o*ppo- 
nhee’s rooms. Here they were 

'd since Gilbert had saun- 
‘ore. It was solitary no 
id laughing audibly 
long the terrace fac- 
'nd were beguiling 
> friends all the 
'ng, and were 
before going 
'>fore were 
’aylight 


THE SUH-MAID. 


143 


at the ball that morning, and were setting to work merrily again! 
Society had collected for a short time, to enjoy themselves, each 
other, and the mountains before the sun quite set. 

Upon this scene came Madame Zophee and Gilbert, he pausing to 
greet Morton and the De Veuils; she being inteirupted in her proj- 
ect of crossing the Place directly to her hotel by the voice of the 
Princess, who was standing by the parapet with a group of French 
and Spanish ladies, and had observed her pass. 

“ You are out late, Zophee cherie,” she said, advancing to take 
her little friend warmly by the hand. 

“lam, Princess,” Madame Zophee answered. “But 1 am on 
my way home.” 

“ Ah! you are right. 1 will not detain you. You should go in. 
See how the mist rises so quickly, and in two minutes more the sun 
will be gone. Adieu, dear, adieu. 1 do not like to lose you, but 
you are right to go in.” 

And she let Madame Zophee go. Gilbert glanced round and would 
fain have followed, at least to her hotel door. But Madame de 
Veuil had detained him for a moment, and when he looked toward 
Madame Zophee again she was waving a “ good-evening ” to him, 
and then turned without w'aiting to exchange words. She dis- 
appeared between the big gates of the hotel yard, and in another 
moment Marfa appeared, closing her windows with much vehement 
energy, and for that day, at least, she felt to him quite shut away. 
He lingered with his cousin on the Place after that for a while, and 
then, at Bebe Beresford’s invitation, turned into Ihe English Club. 


CHAPTER XVI. 

THE GOLDEN CHAI 

After the peculiar and subtle charm with which music in the 
Basse Plante was ever henceforth invested in Gilbert’s sphere of 
association and memory, the first band day in the Place Roy ale rather 
disappointed him; and this notwithstanding that the brilliancy of the 
scene exceeded all that Bebe had led him to expect The crowd was 
great; the toilets were beautiful; the row of carriages on the boule- 
vard was long, and, as Bebe had promised, from their inmates came 
many bewitching glances of “ blue eyes and gray eyes, black eyes 
and brown,” the two last being, if anything, predominant; for the 
number of pretty Spaniards assembled that gay winter at Pau was 
very large. Gilbert’s various friends were nearly all there —sitting 
in knots and groups and circles round the statue and the trees, walk- 
ing up and down along the boulevard in quartettes and tnos and tete- 
d-tetes ; while the sun shone bright as usual, and the band played 
cheerily on its wood dais, and the view was glorious, and everybody 
seemed delighted with each other and with themselves. 

But still Gilbert was disappointed, for Madame Zophee would not 
Ite persuaded to appear. He would like to have sauntered up and 
down between the trees with her, as Bebe was doing with Miss 
ISietley, and Morton with Jeanne, and Captain Hanleigh with Miss 
Carlisle, and everybody else with his especial friend; or he would 


THE SUKT-MAID. 


144 

have been so happy if she would have joined that groilp around 
lienri’s pedestal where sat the Princess and all the coterie of his aunt 
—indeed, he did not care to join them without her, though he did 
not exactly make that confession to himself. 

He w'as restless; he wandered about unsettled, saying a word to 
every one, coming to anchor by none; and the whole thing failed to 
amuse him, though it boasted so much beauty and toilet, so many 
“ fair women and brave men,” so much glitter of foreign uniforms 
and sparkling of bright eyes, though there was music, and bouquet 
girls, and Spanish merchants, and everything to make the scene 
wonderfully effective and picturesque. 

It was quite late in the afternoon, the music was nearly over, and 
he was tired of watching the groups of smartly dressed children at 
play, and of interrupting other people’s converse by inserting occa- 
sional restless words of his own; and he had paused at last a long 
time behind hjs aunt’s chair, looking listlessly about him, and not 
attending to any conversation at all, when the Princess suddenly, 
with her soft, foreign accentuation, called him by name. 

‘‘ Sir Gilbert, is not that the little Zophee,” she said, ” standing 
on the balcony in her window there behind the floweis?” 

‘‘Yes, of course it is,” he answered, quickly, looking immediately 
round with a suddenly brightened glance in "the direction to which 
the Princess had turned. “ She is listening to the band, I suppose, 
from there.” 

” Why does she not come out to us?” 

“ She will not. Princess,” he answered. “ I went with my aunt 
to ask her quite early in the afternoon. She says she never does 
come on the baud-da)’'s.” 

“No; she has never come before, certainly; but, then, till now, 
she had so far to drive to the music; she was not in town. Ah! she 
does not like it, 1 suppose, the dear little Zophee. She never will 
come in a crowd.” 

“ That is just what she said, Princess,” said Gilbert, ruefully. 
“ It is no good — she will not come.” 

“ And luis she been alone, 1 wonder, all the afternoon? Dear me 
— that is too bad! And 1 know she did not even go for her drive. 
Ah, she sees us!” added the Princess, kissing her finger-tips. “ She 
has seen us from her window as we sit here. Look! she is waving 
her hand to us. Shall we go and talk to her, Sir Gilbert? If she 
would come to the edge of the balconj^ she could hear us speak.” 

“ Capital! Do let us go!” exclaimed Gilbert; and he pulled the 
chairs back and made way for the Princess, who smiled and added 
her explanations to her friends, pointing to Madame Zophee at the 
window; and then she walked away across the place with Gilbert, 

Madame Zophee came out to them as she saw them coming, and 
stood leaning on the stone balustrade above them as they approached. 
A soft shawl was wrapped close round her neck and shoulders, her 
fair quiet face was radiant in the sun-glow and in the light of its 
own sweet welcoming smile. 

“Ah! we have brought you out, you see, after all,” exclaimed 
Gilbert. 

“ We have come to visit you,” said the Princess, “ and see what 
you do in there alone all the afternoon.” 


THE SUN-MAID. 


145 


“ It was kind of you to remember me!” she said, softly, for the 
two countenances below touched her strangely for a moment, as they 
looked up toward her — one so gentle and full of tenderness and cor- 
diality, the other so winning, and so young and bright. 

“ Do not stand there. Princess; do not let me keep you away from 
your friends,” she added, presently. 

“No; on the contrary,” said the Princess, “ I shall not be kept 
away frQm them, for see, they are all coming to visit you too;” and 
she turned round laughing, as Gilbert’s aunt, escorted by old Keffel, 
and the marquis conducting Madame Beaulieu, rose en masse from 
their chairs under the pedestal, and came also across the Place. 

‘‘ Ah! little Solava — galoupka moja!” cried Baron Keffel, waving 
his hand with energy toward the balcony. ” What do you do there 
by yourself alone? W^hy do you not come down, you naughty one,, 
to your pining friends?’’ 

” What do Ido?” said Madame Zophee, brightly, smiling down 
with pleasure and much amusement upon them all. ”1 am just 
having my tea, if you want to know, baron. The samovar is fizzing 
vigorously in the window here at my back.” 

“ The samovar! Ah, you wicked one!” exclaimed the baron, 
shaking his fist up at her with a furious mien. “Where is your 
promise of how long — so long ago — your broken promise — to give 
me a glass of tea?” 

“ A glass of tea! How uncomfortable it sounds!” said the mar- 
quise. ‘ ‘ Zophee dear, 1 hope you have something in there cozier 
than that?” 

“ ]\Ionsieur le Baron knows what he is talking about, marquise,” 
said Zophee. ‘ ‘ A glass of golden chai, with plenty of sugar and 
citron, is a very nice thing, baron, is it not? not to be despised.” 

“ Z>< 3 , lee, shuss!” ejaculated the baron, enthusiastically. “But 
never more, I see, faithless little Solava, to be enjoj^ed by me.” 

“ Why not?” she answered. “ Dear baron, come up and partake 
with me when you will. Marfa will feel it high honor to prepare for 
you. Come and drink chai with me, I beg of you, any afternoon.” 

“ Zophee!” said the Princess, suddenly, “ shall weaW come up and 
have tea with you now? Why should we not? Will you admit us? 
May we come in?” 

“ And a thousand times welcome, dear Princess,” she said. “ I 
am honored and delighted indeed.” 

“ Then we will all come!” continued the Princess, turning with 
energetic resolution to her friends. “ All of us— really, Zophee, you 
say?” 

“ As many as you please; if many, the more welcome. Princess,” 
she replied. ‘ 

“ Charming!” cried the marquise. 

“ Brava! brava!” exclaimed old Keffel. 

“ Enchantee,” muttered Mada^fie de Beaulieu. 

“ A very most excellent idea!” added the marquis. 

“1 too? 1 may come?” said Gilbert, stopping Zophee for a 
moment as she turned away. 

“ If you care to come, yes; most certainly,” she said. “ I cannot 
leave you out in the cold, can 1?” 

“ In the cold indeed it would be,” he replied, laughing with pleas- 


146 THE SUH-MAID. 

ure at the prospect. “No, 1 do not think you could be quite so 
cruel as that.” 

Then he hastened after the rest of the party, and in another mo- 
ment they all presented themselves at Madame Zophee’s door. 

The room looked quiet and shadowy and warmly fire-lit as they 
entered. The sun had crept away, and the evening was falling 
quickly, but the glow of the big burning logs in the open chimney 
was ruddy and filled the room pleasantly with changeful cblor and 
light. The shadow's w'ere soft in the corners and in the embrasures 
of the heavy curtain-folds; the air was sweet with the odors of 
flowers; and over all pervaded a sense of comfort, home-like and in- 
viting, and that air of artistic refinement with which Madame Zo- 
phee ever invested her surroundings, here as in the chalet on the 
Pyrenees. The samovar fizzed, as she had said, on a table near the 
fire-place; and Marfa, with many glasses, was there already at her 
call. Her easel w'as set up by the window, a half finished picture 
resting upon it; and palette, paints, and brushes were scattered 
round. The piano was open, and on its desk was a volume of the 
“Songs of the Russian People,” showing that Madame Zophee’s 
thoughts that day had been wandering far. Books lay about on the 
table; low arm-chairs, also transplanted from the chalet, w'ere 
grouped near the window and fire -place, and close on to one of these 
— lately occupied perhaps, for an open book had been left on a table - 
near — ^lay Lustoff ; his huge limbs were stretched out on a soft rug 
in the full glow of the warm fire, and he was sunk deep in an abso- 
lute perfection of slumber and repose. 

“ How charming you look!” said the Princess, as she came in, 
Madame Zophee meeting her with a welcoming smile on the thresh- 
old of her door. .“ How sweet and comfortable and quiet you look, “ 
dear!” she went on, bending to kiss her little friend softly on both 
checks. “ Do w'e disturb you very much?” she added, caressingly. 

“ See, we have all, every one of us, come.” 

“And 1 am so glad!” Madame Zophee answered — “delighted. 
Indeed, 1 was very tired of being alone. How kind of you. Princess; 
and dear marquise — ah! I am so enchanted; and Madame de 
Beaulieu, 5 'ou do me great honor. Come in, mesdames and mes- 
sieurs, 1 beg of you to come in. Sir Gilbert — ah!” she continued, 
giving him her left hand wuth a soft answer of welcome in her 
glance to his smile of satisfaction, “ here you are too!” 

“ Yes, here we are, all of us! And there is the samovar!” cried 
Baron K effel, making a hasty entry, forgetting in his delight to 
finish his salutation or his bow, but continuing, “ Now I am hap- 
py, now at last I wull have it. vProm your own fair fingers, galoupka 
moja, 1 will take a glass of chai.” 

“ Y^ou shall certainly,” said Madame Zophee, who was still busy- 
ing herself with Gilbert’s assistance in seating her lady friends. - 
“You must all drink chai with me.^and eat, besides, my bread and 
salt.” 

Then there surely never w'as a pleasanter tea-party. So Gilbert 
thought — except one, jrerhaps, when he had himself on another oc- 
casion eaten, the bread from her hand, and taken the salt from the 
little chased casket she had lield out to him, and had sipped the 
golden chai. Zophee remembered this, and gave him no bread and 


THE SUK-MAID. 


147 


salt this time, as he had eateu it before; but she .er him help her to 
pour out the fragrant liquid into the tall thin glasses, and to put the 
sugar and the citron slices in, and he did it willingly, so very will- 
ingly, though almost in silence, for she had visitors in such numbers 
to entertain that afternoon, and they were mostly all visitors who 
liked each on his own account a fair share in the discourse. So there 
was a deal of talking, and no want of laughter, noise, and merriment 
unlimited, in Madame Zophee’s salon for at least an hour. They all 
felt it was a pleasant hour; a new way, too — which was in itself a 
great thing — a new way of spending this sunset period after the band 
was gone; and as the Princess rose, and the other ladies with her, to 
bid their little hostess adieu, they said the afternoon had been so 
pleasant that it must be repeated, and Zophee found herself agreeing 
to receive them to chai and wafers at sunset on (as people there ex- 
pressed it) “ every Thursday of band.” 

” You will not come down to us, you know,” said the Princess,, 
as they left her, “ so we must come up to you.” 


CHAPTER XVII. 

W'HAT THEN? 

Much as these first days at Pau had slipped away fast for Gilbert^ 
and for every one, so many of the days glided after them. 

” Hunting-days,” ” off-days,” ” band-days,” and some days when 
nothing particular happened, but w'hich often managed to turn out 
the pleasantest days of all; and the season sped on, Gilbert al wavs 
enjoying it. He enjoyed the balls, taking to dancing very kindly 
after the first plunge, even though Madame Zophee never valsed 
with him to ” La Rose” again, ^ He enjoyed the hunting, never 
grumbling if the runs were mediocre, accustomed though he had 
been— all his hunting days— to something different in ‘‘ the shires.” 
it was not in his nature to grumble; he left that to Captain Hanleigh 
and his imitators; he himself, if the run was poor, always finding 
what he called “a make-up ’’—sometimes much more than “a 
make-up ”— in a few minutes’ converse with his friend as he over- 
took her victoria on his way to the meet or on his return; or, another 
day, it was a pleasant ride home with Miss Netley, perhaps, or some 
gay little Amazon equally lively and kind, or a cheery meeting with 
some old hunting acquaintance from other and distant fields; or if 
none of these came in his way, the beauty of the ride itself always 
pleased him, and was enough to bring him home in that good 
humor and in those bright spirits which never failed. 

“ Come in, my dear boy, come in; you are like a sunbeam to me, 
his aunt often said, as he opened her drawing-room door of an after- 
noon at tea-time, radiant in his hunting-coat and fresh from the air. 
“ Come in — come in, and give us all the news of the day; and he 
would go in and sit down, and amuse her and her little group of as- 
sembled friends by his anecdotes of the adventures of the hunt, aU 
told in a merry, humorous way that would keep them laughing and 
cheerful over the tea-tray through the twilight hours of many win- 
ter afternoons. 


THE SUK-MAID. 


148 

He and old Keif el became great friends through all this, and found 
in each other’s society an attraction that was a mystery to most peo- 
ple, and to his aunt a most special delight. Their repartee — or 
“ chaff,” as Gilbert taught the baron correctly to term their style of 
converse — lighted up with a new and sparkling element the little 
gatherings of the marquise’s coterie in the Rue de Lycee; and it was 
certainly owing verj’^ much to Gilbert’s constant presence that a light 
and happy vein ran through the causeries — whether literary, artistic, 
musical, or political— of the marquise’s evenings and afternoons, 
causing that winter, indeed, to linger in the memory of the little 
circle as one of the pleasantest ever passed at the Hotel St. Hilaire. 

The coterie of the marquise was in these days the choice kernel of 
Pau society— a glowing center to whioh everything that was worth 
attracting in the vastly hetrogeneous elements of the general crowd 
gravitated, insensibly drawn by the magnetism of sympathetic tastes. 
The marquise had that special and most valuable perceptive gift of 
quickly recognizing, among the crowds of every conceivable nation 
— who assembled, all new and unfamiliar, each returning year— the 
special units that would suit herself ; and as the season opened she 
would flit to and fro across the brightly-flowering garden of Pau 
society, and cull rapidly the social bouquet with wMch she adorned 
her room. 

She often found her rarest flowers blooming in shady comers, 
“ wasting their sweetness, ” unappreciated and unknown; or, to speak 
in plainer words, it was not only in the glittering ball-rooms or on 
the band-days on the Place that she sought and often found her 
choicest friends, but in other scenes, lingering perhaps in sick-rooms, 
banished from the gay world by incapacity either of health or purse; 
sometimes lonely, friendless, and unnoticed in all that' busy whirl 
till discovered by her. Thus she found in the course of investiga- 
tion during that winter an Austrian violinist, hanging sadly over a 
sick and failing wife ; a Danish poet, who was wandering very help- 
less and very friendless to and fro; a young S«vedish singer, whose 
failing voice was already returning, in that soft atmosphere, to what, 
Madame Zophee said, were tones of the Solava indeed. 

The marquise visited and comforted and helped them all, and drew 
them one by one into the magic circle of the Rue de Lycee. Then 
she picked up by the wayside, in a drive one day, an artist, clever 
in landscape, but still more in caricature. He was soon installed 
among them; and every day, and all day, he drew the members of 
the coterie under every possible circumstance, and with every variety 
of mien. Baron Keffel with his nose inquisitively poked before him 
and very high in the air; the marquise at her embroidery-frame; the 
Princess sitting near her, Chartelljer offering her a cup of tea ; Ma- 
dame Zophee standing at her easel in a window all festooned with 
foliage and set in a back ground of the mountain view; Gilbert in 
his hunting-dress; the marquis with his snuff-box; Morton bend- 
ing at the piano behind pretty Jeanne; the poet, with an inspiration, 
tearing his hair; the violinist playing a Stradivarius much larger 
than himself— all were immortalized on little scraps of card and 
paper that layin profusion throughout the winter in the salon and 
the violet boudoir, raising many a laugh from the victims and from 
their friends. 


THE SUN- MAID. 


149 

Indeed, gay thougli the balls were, and capital the hunting, with 
the pleasantest rides to and from the meet; cheery the whist hours 
at the club; bright the crowded gathering on the Place or on the 
cricket-field; beyond all these Gilbert placed first in his heart and 
estimation the enjoyment of those “ little evenings,” as his aunt 
termed them, with the coterie at her house. 

A three-cornered note would reach him often just before dinner, at 
the whist hour, worded something in this way: 

“ Dearest G Morton says you dine with ‘ fellows ’ at the 

club to-night; but as there is nothing doing afterward, do, like a dear 
boy, come in about nine to me. 

Yours, 

“ViOLETTE DE St. H .” 

And he answered cordially with an assent, for he would feel cer- 
tain that a number of these little notes had been showered about like 
a snow-fall by Baptiste during the afternoon, and that one had been 
dropped without fail at Madame Zophee’s door. He would finish 
his whist then in good spirits, whether he won his money or not; 
for a pleasant evening was before him, of which the thought 

cooed ” like an echo of soft music for the next three hours in his 
heart. 

In his aunt’s softly lighted luxuriant drawing-room, to which he 
•would repair according!}^ about nine o’clock, his brightest hopes of 
enjoyment rarely failed to be realized. He would enter to find the 
English tea-table set out cozily on one side, lights glowing at the 
piano, a huge pile of logs burniug brightly on the hearth. His uncle, 
with both hands folded, and feet stretched forth comfortably toward 
the blaze, generally sunk in deepest slumber, occupied always the 
rug at one side; and, however noisy the company, he never seemed 
to feel disturbed. The marquise he would find at her embroidery- 
frame, putting finishing touches to the shepherd in her gay-colored 
wools, sitting behind the pink shaded lamp, as on the first night 
when he beheld her at St. Hilaire. The Princess, talking softly to 
Madame Zophee, sat always in her especial seat, 'and round her and 
the marquise grouped the Beaulieus, the De Veuils, and Kefliel, 
with many others equally welcome and familiar, all accustomed fre- 
quenters of the Hotel St. Hilaire. Morton and Chartellier generally 
handed the tea; Gilbert, after a feint of assisting them, finding his 
way was always to a chair near Madame Zophee’s side. There he 
would linger, perfectly happy, and curiously pleased with himself 
. and his society, through the whole evening, often without moving 
again. 

Everybody chatted and laughed in that assembly unceasingly, and 
sometimes they played a game — poetry games, and geographical and 
fanciful games, involving much power of imagery, and of knowledge 
both of localities and flowers : curious and ingenious feats of intel- 
lectual dexterity, from which Gilbert carefully refrained, sheltering 
himself behind his ignorance of language from such efforts. 

Sometimes their poet read to them or recited with much dramatic 
power and success; or Hermannricht, the violinist, played and Zo- 
phee accompanied him; or the young Swedish artiste chanted de- 
liciously for an hour together, in return for which Madame Zophee 


150 


THE SUN'MAII>. 


would be persuaded to sing one of ber quaint Russian melodies or 
her wild Southern, perhaps Tsiganie, songs. So the time would slip 
away till the chime of midnight would remind them of its passing; 
and then (after some slight refreshment of red wine, sherry and 
seltzer, eau 8ucree, lemonade, or clwcolat glace, partaken of by the 
guests according to their respective nations and tastes), they would all 
depart together, and in the court-yard separate and turn in different 
directions, and walk home through the beautiful soft night. Gilbert 
at such times gained often a pleasant moment, all the sweeter, per- 
haps, because so short, and fleeting, when Madame Zophee allowed 
him to take that bit of moonlight walk with Jier, just from the gate- 
way of the Maison St. Hilaire to the corner of the Place Royale and 
the door of the Hotel de France. 

Of such evenings many and many, as the winter sped on, came 
again and again, and to Gilbert they were the center of all the happy 
experience that flowed over that period of his life— the center where 
tJte stone fell which caused all the circling and eddying and rippling 
of sensible felicity within and around him. The circles were many, 
they were varied, and they stretched out wide and far; but here lay 
that center which, indeed, though often unrecognized, we find al- 
ways does exist in happiness and is to human happiness the life- 

f iving heart. He recognized this so far, after a little while, as he ac- 
nowledged to himself, that these evenings in his aunt’s salon — the 
one time and place where Madame Zophee was always certain to be 
found — were pleasanter, to his thinking, than all the ball-going of 
Pau put together ; but beyond this, he seemed further away even 
than he had been on the coteaux at St. Hilaire from realizing any 
more. Life here in town was so busy and so exciting, and his time 
was so filled up from morning till night, that his mind was ever act- 
ively engaged. There were few, indeed no, opportunities of serious 
converse in these days between him and his friend; and finding 
themselves Ute-d-tete, even for a short time, was exceedingly rare. 
And then when they did meet, there was so much to talk about, so 
many subjects for light, surface discussion and controversy about 
present and surrounding people and events and scenes, that their 
friendship remained quite on the surface all through that period, 
and their intercourse, though continuous, was not characterized by 
any evidence of sentiment upon either side. 

“ Le petit comite de persiflage,” was what Baron Keff el called the 
assemblage in the Rue de Lycee, often in venomous condemnation 
of the frothiness of their habitual talk; and this characteristic, 
springing, as before said, very much from the effect of Gilbert’s 
presence among them, entered largely into the elements of the inter- 
course at this time between Madame Zophee and himself. So life 
rolled on— spontaneously, brightly, and merrily as the ring of sleigh- 
bells jingling over the sunlit snow, and the friendship between Gil- 
bert and Zophee flowed on as brightly and easily as everytl»ing else. 
Iso one disturbed them either with rousing observation or remark, 
for Paul, as we have said, was accustomed to Madame Zophee ; and 
be it confessed, Pau was accustomed to Platonic friendships, and 
even to flirtations as well. In the southern scenes, beneath these 
radiant skies, in the land of flowers, and in these perpetual sum- 
mers, where people flock in numbers and linger the long months 


/ 


THE Sb^N-MAII). 


151 


through, and meet often, more than daily — morning, noon, and 
night — on the hunting-field or in the ball-room, at the twilight teas 
or on the Place; meet again and again and again— mutual interests 
will arise, individualities of taste will assert themselves, and friend- 
ships will spring up — pleasant, heartfelt, and cordial friendships — 
because fleeting, perhaps none the less sweet. Pau, was accustomed 
to these things, and so Madame Zophee and Gilbert were left quite 
undisturbed. 

On his side, his aunt and Morton had forgotten him, or rather had 
become familiar with his appearance, lingering unfailingly by their 
little Russian guest. The marquise was busy with her friends, and 
full of engagements; she had cautioned Gilbert at St. Hilaire, and he 
had reassured her. How she was simply glad that he was happy 
and stayed so long with them, and quite complacently, all the win- 
ter-time, she left him alone. Morton’s marriage was fixed, too, for 
the early spring, and he, with numberless consequent considerations 
in his head, had not one thought to spare for anybody. So no one 
noticed Gilbert, and no one knew Madame Zophee well enough to 
venture upon the subject with her, except, indeed, one fri —the 
Princess; and, after long delay and much cogitation, she spoke. 

It was late in the winter, when the Russian teas upon the band- 
days and evening meetings in the Rue de Lycee had gone on for a 
long time, that one day she was sitting with Madame Zophee, talk- 
ing quietly with her wdiile the latter finished a view of the Pic of 
Bigorre, the village of Gans lying in the foreground, and the mist 
curling down the valley across the Gave. They had been talking 
for a time, and had been quite undisturbed until, just as the twi- 
light began to creep over the view, some one knocked at the door, 
and, at Madame Zophee’s call of “ Come in!” Gilbert entered the 
room. 

He had come with a message from the marquise, with some sug- 
gestion for the evening, some invitation or special reason for Ma- 
dame Zophee to join the circle on that particular night; and he gave 
his message, after he had greeted the Princess, in his usual cheerful, 
vigorous tones, wdth the easy, unconscious manner which was al- 
ways natural to him. 

There w^as a touch of additional warmth and a softened intonation 
in his voice, perhaps, which the Princess noted critically, as he bent 
toward Madame Zophee, and his manner to her was a combination 
of graceful familiarity, sprung from prolonged intercourse, with the 
chivalrous courtesy which distinguished him as an Englishman and 
as her respectful friend. 

But as he stood by the easel and looked over her picture, and then 
looked from it back to the artist again, and let his glance rest in- 
quiringly upon liev rather than on her work, which she would ex- 
hibit to him, there w^as a sweet light in his large blue eyes that quiv- 
ered and changed quite involuntarily and quite unconsciously to 
himself as she bent over her canvas; and thus resting his eyes on her, 
he lingered a few minutes by her side. 

There was something that touched the Princess in the very bright- 
uess of his glance. He looked so young and graceful as he stood there, 
so happy, so unconscious of everything in life save its sunshine, so 
unsuspicious of anything that life might have in store for him. And 


152 I^he sun-maid. 

the Princess’ kind eyes had suffused and glistened as they r^te^ 
upon him, and her voice had trembled as she bid him good-by. 
When he was gone, she rose and came close to Zophee, and put hec 
white, sparkling fingers upon her little friend’s arm. ^ 

“ That English boy will love you, Zophee,” she said, softly. 

Madame Zophee’s hands were both filled with brush and palette^ 
but she laid the latter down instantly and turned to the Princess. ^ 

‘‘ No, no — not so! You mistake, dear Princess, you mistake in- 
deed,” were the words she said in answer; but her cheek grew deadly 
pale as she uttered them, and she looked up wiih a look in her eyes 
that contradicted the assurance of her speech. 

” 1 do not think I mistake,” continued the Princess, quietly. “ If 
you do not wish it, Zophee, you must not deceive yourselt, niy dear^ 
and think it will not be.” 

Madame Zophee turned away then. She seemed uncertain for a 
moment what further to say; but her ej^es wandered far away, 
across the mountain-tops to the still sweetness of the sky, and a 
strange quivering light of pain shot from them as they were ayerledj 
she draw her breath quickly, with a gesture that spoke an inward 
struggle, a strong self-restraint, a quick effort to summon instant self- 
control. But the pain was there still, when she turned them again 
upon the Princess, the quivering expression of a heart pierced with, 
a silent anguish, and as she spoke again she struggled for her lost 
composure in vain. Pier voice rang with a sirance echo of suffering 
in her tones, her lip trembled; she could scarcely steady it to form 
the words. 

” 1 hope indeed it is not so. Princess/’ she said. ” I think it is 
not. Watch him, listen to him, hear his laughing voice, and see his 
boyish, unconscious ways. Oh, Princess, may 1 not believe that all 
is well? May 1 not be happy? May I not feel that it need not be 
so; that it is not his way; that it is not in his nature; that — heat 
least is safe?” 

‘‘Zophee, Zophee! my poor little one,” answered the Princess, 
” why talk like this? Why that sad, sad look in those sweet eyes? 
And if he did love you,” she continued, in a hesitating and lowered 
tone, ‘‘ well, must you be always lonely, always mourning a sorrow- 
ful past? Zophee, dearest, do not fear me!” she added, hastily, as 
the other averted her face again, and put out her hand in eager de- 
precation. ‘‘ Do not fear; 1 am not going to infringe upon our 
compact, on the limits of our confidence as agreed between us so 
long ago. Your secret shall remain, all untroubled, your own, now, 
as it has been; but must it be so forever, my Zophee? May there 
never be one — just that right one — who may hear all your story, and 
give you once again the comfort of confidence and strength and love? 
May it never be so? Is yours always to be thus a lonely and a shad- 
owed life?”' 

Then, as the Princess’ voice trembled and vibrated with the ten- 
derness of her solicitude, Madame Zophee laid her arm upon the easel- 
desk in front of her, and her head bent low upon it till her face was 
quite hidden from view ; and she put out the other hand and clasped 
the Princess’ for a moment, with an eager and feverish pressure 
that spoke passionate emotion too strong for words. For a moment 
complete silence reigned between them, the Princess speaking her 


THE SUN-MAID. 


153 


oympatliy only by caressing the trembling hand she held between 
both her own. ^ Then, as Madame Zophee still spoke not, and again 
and again a quiver of agitation seemed to vibrate through her whole 
frame, the Princess bent and kissed her softly, put her arm gently 
round her shoulder, and — 

“ Forgive me,” she murmured. ” 1 would not pain you. For- 
give me, forgive me, Zophee!” she repeateed again. 

Then Zophee looked up at last. She took both the Princess’ 
hands in her own ; she gazed eagerly, earnestly into her face, her 
dark eyes still laden with agitation and with pain. 

“ Dear and best and tenderest friend,” she said, ” cfmyou forgive 
me my silence, my reticence, my want of confidence, as it must seem 
to you? Can you forgive me? All confidence indeed you richly 
deserve of me, and how scantily have I repaid! When 1 think of 
the years that have been — of how you have received me, and be- 
lieved in me, and cared for me, you and many others, but, abo>e all, 
you — sweet friend, most loved and most revered, can 1 withhold any 
secret from you? How can 1? How can 1? And yet 1 .si.” 

“ Dear one,” urged the Princess, ‘‘ do not distress yourself. As 
it has been, Zophee, so let it be. As it has been between us for 
these five years, so let it be, if it please God, for five times as many 
more.” 

” I have told you, you know. Princess,” continued Zophee, with 
a wistful, pleading pathos, ” I have told you, long, long ago, how — 
it is — a promise — a sacred trust that I hold; a secret in my keeping 
— that 1 honor for the sake of one 1 love. 1 have told you that he is 
my guardian and my adopted father, and that I owe him — owe him 
fully all 1 give him when I give my life.” 

“Hush, hush, Zophee!” the Princess murmured. “1 asK no 
more, and 1 seek nothing. You have told me, 1 know you have 
told me, what you can. I am satisfied to build up my faith and 
affection, not upon my knowledge of your story, but of you. But, 
dearest,” she added again, earnestly, as she rose to leave, ” one lit- 
tle word 1 must speak once more. The English boy, Zophee — will 
you ask your conscience, you knowing all that 1 do not know — ask 
it, dearest, ask the question bravely, frankly of yourself, and resolve 
to have a reply — if he loves you, what then?” 

A sweet, strange light shot quickly from Zophee’s eyes at these 
last words of the Princess, and for an instant a bright, soft smile 
curled her lip. 

” If he love me, what then?” she whispered. 

But like a lightning flash it was gone, that gleam of soft light, 
and the darkness fell once more. She turned restlessly away, as the 
princess dropped her hand. 

“ Good-by,” Zophee murmured. “ Thank you, thank you many 
times, dear friend. Indeed 1 will think— 1 mean 1 have thought— 
indeed I try — 1 try to do right. But what is right? That is what I 
ask myself again and again; and yet — but nay — 1 will think once 
more, strongly, sternly, because you have spoken to me; and 1 will 
again resolve I will do something — something to save him — if needs 
oe, and you think indeed it needs must be— something to save him, 
1 promise you Princess, I wdll do. Thank you, thank you, let me 
say again. Trust me— indeed^you may.” 


154 


THE SUX-MAID. 


“ To save him/’ repeated the Princess, softly, coming back once 
more to encircle Madame Zophee with her arm. “ Does he need it^ 
He will hope not, if loving you, little Zophee, is a peril from which 
he must be saved. But even if it be not so, may 1 say yet another 
word? iiDoyou ever think, my dear one, of any danger to your- 
self?” 

Then again Zophee hid her face away — this time on the shoulder 
of her kind friend — and she stood silent a moment, while the Prin- 
cess bent and smoothed softlj’^ the dusky waves of her hair. 

” To myself,” she murmured, presently, looking up again with a 
clear, composed look now in her dark eyes. ” For myself I am so 
used. Princess, to expect pain, separation, self-effacement, and loss, 
that 1 have come to take it quieily as my lot— the portion life has in 
store for me; to take it calmly with resignation, ever ready, ever ex- 
pecting, ever prepared. ’ ’ 

“Hush! hush!” murmured her friend again, with tender solici- 
tude, as Zophee’s face sunk once more to veil her emotion w’^hen she 
had uttered these last words. “ Hush! do not talk so sadly of your 
young life. Be hopeful, mj-- Zophee. There are no clouds, believe 
me, across our w^hole life’s horizon — no clouds which will not some 
day rise.” 

” Mine was not a cloud,” whispered Zophee. ” It was the sun 
darkened while it was still scarce risen on my life. And the night 
fell before,” she added, softly, “long before I knew even what it 
was, or what it might be to live in sunshine and day.” 

After that conversation Zophee one day spoke to Gilbert — tried 
hard to draw him out, and to reach those under-currents which the 
Princess insisted must lie beneath the surface of his heart. And she 
came:«pon nothing, as deeper and deeper she carefully felt her way 
— upon nothing but more and more of that same glittering, rushing, 
shallow stream which described, from the fringe of its outer edge to 
the very spring at its deepest fountain, the under-currents of Gil- 
bert’s sentiments, hopes, and aspirations at that time, as far as he 
knew them himself. And then (being a woman, and aware that 
there was a w'ell of different feeling springing up and giving forth 
its deep reflection within her own heart) she retained still the opinion 
that she had formed very early in their acquaintance, and felt that 
if there was danger in all this happy intercourse between her and, as 
she called him in her own mind, “this sunny hearted boy,” the 
danger was to her own solitary and desolate self, and not at all to 
him. 

” It is not in him,” she said, as she came back to her owm room, 
and to her own habitual loneliness that evening, after the conversa- 
tion between them, in 'which she had tried to discover warily if there 
was any reason on his side for the Princess’s fears. ” It is not in 
him,” she murmured; and as she did so she sighed. “For, be- 
sides,” she soliloquized, “ my youth is past; all attractions of that 
kind, if I ever had any, have gone from me, worn away by solitude 
and dreariness, and long, long years; and he is all hopefulness and 
youth. In me there is nothing to weaken a deeper feeling than kind- 
ly friendship in such a one as he is. His glance will be as bright 
into many a fair face, younger and far happier than mine, before it 
lights on the one that will kindle in hi^ own heart anjAliing that may 


THE SUN -MAID. 


155 


be lasting or strong. It is a liappy life, a radiant, fresh young 
spirit; and as a pleasing, charming, and courteous friend he will 
<jome and go. 1 know 1 am right,” she thought on, “ Ah, by my 
own heart surely 1 know it. How frank and unshadowed his glance 
was, as he answered mine to-night I How light the pressure of his 
hand as he clasped mine in farewell! How ready and eager were 
all his words, springing to his lips in quick sentences, all thought- 
less and unconscious! There is not the least danger, certainly, for 
him; and for me? Ah!” she murmured on, 

“ ‘ Thou, in whose presence I forgot to smile, 

Counting the moments that too quickly flee, 

Oh, hide, oh, hide my fearful eyes awhile 
From that dark future where thou wilt not be !’ 

“Is it SO indeed— with me? Bright young being! what a sun- 
shine he has been to me. What a summer he has flooded suddenly 
lacross my gray life! And is this even wrong — for me? Is this love^ 
that 1 try to call friendship? Is this sin, that I am trying to excuse 
to myself? God knows, I cannot tell. It is sweetness; it is like 
•chords of music, like the rhythm of a poem echoing through my 
-days; but is it love? 1 cannot help it, I cannot fleeHt. 1 cannot 
leave here— not now, at all events; and I cannot drive him from me 
even if 1 would. But would I? Must I? Ought I? What is my 
judgment before the tribunals of God and man? God knows; God 
understands. My life is before Him— all its difliculties, its entangle- 
ments, its fears. And He knows to what I have vowed it. He 
knows, as none here know, the promises and the weight of duty 
that lie so heavj'^ upon my heart and head. Am I right that I live 
thus?” So her thoughts sped on that evening. “ Am 1 right that 
I thus lay down, in sacrifice and solitude, my brightest years? 
Eight to die — for surely it is death in life; to die — for what? for a 
past, for a shadow, for a name!” 

She was looking from her windolv, as she had been murmuring to 
herself these words over the valley, all lighted up with moonlight, 
toward the glories of the nature- world, from which came her cease- 
less consolation, toward the mountains she so dearly loved; but at 
the point when her head sunk and her heart quivered with these self- 
questioning doubts, she turned suddenly and passed out of her salon 
into her bedroom, as if she would seek still further comfort from 
something she knew was there. The room, as she entered, was 
softly illumined by a glowing light that burned constant in one cor- 
ner before her “ Rhiza,” and also by a small alabaster lamp stand- 
ing upon a sort of bureau that lined the wall on one side. It was to 
this bureau that Madame Zophee turned. It was covered^ with old, 
curious-looking books and manuscripts, with a little writing-case in 
Russian leather, with some much- worn furnishings of a writing- 
table, quaintly decorated with precious Siberian stones, and with 
various curious odds and ends, foreign-looking and unfamiliar, in 
the midst of which burned the small alabaster lamp, shedding a soft 
and tempered glow. Madame Zophee leaned upon this bureau and 
looked upward: two portraits hung just above her head. 

One was of a young man, very dark and handsome, with restless 
€yes, a noble forehead, straight-down brow, and a curling, sensitive 
Jip, very like her own. The expression of her eyes, as they looked 


THE SUN-MAID. 


156 

out from t]ie picture full of fire, full of energy, full of thought, was; 
like her eyes too — not in her softer, composed, and dreamy moods, 
perhaps, but in their moments of enthusiasm, when some excitement 
roused her and made her glance flash forth sometimes like the light- 
ning in a wintry sky. 

“ Father— my lather!” she murmured, in Russian, as she gazed 
up. ” How many and many a year there was for thee and me when 
life held nothing for either save each other! How many a day when 
thy savior was to me as a god to be worshiped, as a king to be 
served, and to the heart’s blood obeyed! And are these days forgot- 
ten? No, no! They still live; they still are. And now, father, 
the heart’s blood is shed. 1 serve, as I promised thee; 1 worship 
and 1 obey. And is he not worthy?” she continued, passionately, 
turning then to the other picture, w'hich was a portrait of a stem- 
looking and much older man. ” Is he not worthy, now as then, of 
the sacrifice— the little sacrifice of my father’s daughter’s life? 
Worthy — worthy! yes; worthy ten thousand times. He saved my 
life, and the debt is paid, being daily, hourly paid — with my years 
I pay it. Yes, for he saved thy life, my father, and 1 — saved his 
name. And name is dearer than life; and honor is more than hap- 
piness; and career and success and great aims achieved, and great 
thoughts all realized, are more than liberty or love. And so the 
debt is paid, my father, in my sacrifice, for I give him thee.” 

“ Since our country, our God, O, my sire, 

' Demand that thy daughter expire ; 

Since thy triumph was bought by thy vow — 

Strike the bosom that’s bared for thee now ! 

If the hand that I love lay me low, 

There cannot be pain in the blow I 

if * * * * it: 

I have won the great battle for thee, 

And my father and country are free. 

I do not know that these lines exactly occurred to Madame 
Zophee’s mind, but they express more forcibly than any other 
words could do the feeling with which she raised her arms from 
their resting-place on the bureau, and, with one deep sigh of re- 
newed self-discipline and resolution, turned slowly away. 


CHAPTER XVIll. 

AWAKENING. 

” 1 ENVY any one,” said a friend of mine, lately, who had seen 
most places and things worthy of admiration in Europe— ” 1 envy 
any one who sees a spring at Pau.” 

If the winter has been fine, and not too often broken in upon by 
deluges of mountain rain, it has been delightful, no doubt, every 
day of it, and like a gay, glittering dream it has flitted rapidly away. 
It is gone as soon as it seems here; and it would be regretted, "if 
spring were not so very beautiful, coming freshly on us in its tuin. 
It conies so suddenly. We have a few days of rain, perhaps, with 
the mists lying low in the valley and on the coteaux, and despair 
filling the hearts of all society at Pau, as if the sun never 7iad shone 


THE SUis^-MAID. 


157 

or never would shine again; and then the sky breaks, the clouds lift 
from the summit of the mountains, rapidly and suddenly, as on that 
first night when Gilbert, wonderingly, beheld them — and lol the 
snow is nearly gone. 

Winter has passed away in those sweet, refreshing showers at 
which we had grumbled so loudly, and spring breaks and beams 
upon us deliciously, filling our hearts with gladness and delight. It 
comes so early, too— weeks earlier, in that Paradis terrestre of the 
Pyrenees, than we think of it at home; and it comes with flowers, 
and rich, soft, sprouting verdure, over coteaux and sloping woods. 
It smiles to us from green banks where the violets spring, sweet and 
abundant, from fields starred with anemones and narcissus, and 
from vineyards where the dew-drops on the soft young leaves sparkle 
like diamonds in the sunlight, and where the scent of wild-brier and 
blossom fills the fresh mountain air. 

Thus spring broke upon them in the Rue de Lycee while Gilbert 
still felt that the winter was scarcely begun. It had been a beauti- 
ful winter, and so it was really a very early spring. In the garden 
at St. Hilaire, before March had passed, he and Morton found, when 
they rode over of an afternoon, the camellias blooming rich and beau- 
tiful round the marquise’s boudoir window and at the porch, and 
the roses at the chalet were bursting into flower already long before 
the feast of the Russian Easter had come. The Place Royale was 
crowded now with flower-girls, selling sweet-scented violets, or 
standing with rows of potted plants in full bloom in the upper cor- 
ner under the trees ; and the cotillon bouquets at the great ball of 
Mi- Car erne, or Mid-Lent, were so beautiful that year that they were 
talked of at Pau for many an after-day. 

Picnics began to be suggested before Lent was well over that 
spring, and all sorts of projects were floating in the minds of Mor- 
ton and^Gilbert for mountain expeditions when the snow was quite 
gone— all to come off speedily, before Gilbert’s return to England:.iu 
April, or Morton’s marriage, which was fixed for after Easter- week. 

Madame Zophee began to talk of returning lo the chalet; and Gil- 
bert began to heave melancholy sighs, and to look very disconsolate 
at the prospect of the merry season drawing to a close. Bui, his 
mind was still very happy and fully occupied, and he did not allow 
himself to realize anything concerning the future or the general and 
quickly impending state of things. 

Very different indeed was his frame of feelings just then from 
Madame Zophee’s. Separation implied nothing to him. I’he word 
had never occurred to him. It had never been contemplated, ex- 
perienced, or realized. Separation, to her, from every one close or 
very dear to her heart was so familiar, so clearly anticipated, so fully 
expected, and indeed already, in this case, long ago realized. She 
awaited it with resignation and composure — the end of this bright, 
quick- fleeting time, the loss of this sunny companion; his return to 
his own distant life, of which he spoke so often, to which he was so 
accustomed and attached; and her return to her home and to her 
mountains, and all her dumb associates, who alone shared with her 
the solitude of her life. And that friendship he talked of so often, 
what would it become? A memory to him, a sinking echo, linger- 
ijig and dying away into the shadowy chaos of a past. And to her 


THE SUK-MAID. 


158 

—what had love ever been to her but this? Something to be forgot- 
ten! What would friendship, as he called it, be to him but some- 
thing he would soon forget? So they died always, she told herself 
— these quick-formed friendships, born of sunshine and gay inter- 
course, and of merriment and flowers. And so would flit away the 
story of this winter, for he would doubtless return to England, 
shortly, and she would go back to the chalet again. 

These days were drawing near when, late one afternoon, Gilbert, 
returning home from the hunt, suddenly remembered that his aunt 
had given him a little commission for Madame Zophee which he 
had forgotten to deliver to her as they talked together in the morn- 
ing, when he had overtaken her victoria as he rode to the meet; so 
at the corner of the Rue de Lycee he turned his horse’s head down 
the Place instead of toward his own abode, and he rode slowly be- 
low the club windows to the big gates of the H6tel de France; there 
he dismounted. There were many people this fine afternoon saun- 
tering up and down in the checkered shade and sunshine of the 
Place, and many of his acquaintances among them. He did not 
linger, however, to exchange words with any one, but merely raised 
his hat in return to various smiling salutations ^ that reached him 
from between the rows of trees, and then, giving his rein to his 
groom, who stood there in waiting, he turned into ihe couit yard of 
the hotel. 

He mounted the broad steps and passed into the hall, and there, 
at the door of Monsieur Gardere’s office, he paused, and for a mo- 
ment looked round surprised. The hall seemed crowded with peo- 
ple, and stuffed up on every side with luggage, with huge, queer, 
foreign-looking portmanteaus and cases, waiting to be carried up- 
stairs. Porters were rushing about, and Monsieur Gardere himself 
was giving orders with much excitement and importance; several 
solemn-looking men servants, dressed in a curious livery, moved 
about in different directions, superintending the arrangement of 
effects. Evidently a great arrival had taken place, and Gilbert rec- 
ollected that since he went off hunting in the morning the Paris train 
had come in. He passed out of the hall with the mental observa- 
tion that Monsieur Gardere looked far too busy at that moment to 
satisfy his curiosity, promising himself to make inquiries about the 
new arrivals as he came out again, and then he turned down the 
long corridor toward Madame Zophee’s room. 

There was a large window at the far end of the corridor some dis- 
tance beyond the door of her salon ; and at the window, as he trod 
the passage, he saw standing, a little to his surprise, her servant 
Ivan, in close, low-toned conversation with a grave- looking man in 
plain, dark attire. They were not conversing in French, Gilbert 
detected as he approached, notwithstanding the lowness of the sup- 
pressed tones, but in Ivan’s own native tongue, of which the ring 
had grown familiar to Gilbert, though still not understood. He 
walked quickly down the passage, and the men heard him; they 
turned round, and Ivan sprung forward just as Gilbert had touched 
with a low knock Madame Zophee’s door. Ivan said something, 
put up his hand imploringly, came quick toward Gilbert, tried to 
arrest him, but — too late. As he often had done before, as she al- 
ways agreed to his doing, accustomed as she was to see him conn’ 


THE SUK-MAID. 159 

and go, he knocked at the door, and simultaneously opened it, and 
before Ivan could arrest him he had entered the room. 

Then indeed he paused of his own accord, and looked a moment 
in astonishment before he advanced to hold out his hand. The 
bright spring sunshine was flooding across the carpet through ihe 
open window, from which the persieiims had been flung back, and 
it dazzled and confused him for a moment; but then immediately,, 
as he stood there, he saw full and clearly into her room, and, with 
a start of astonishment, he paused. 

Madame Zophee was there. She sat on a low chair, pushed back 
into the shadow of the curtain, out of the glare of the sun, and near 
her, in a fauteuil low as her own and drawn close to her side, sat a 
personage whom he had never seen before — a handsome, dark- 
bearded man of imposing presence and very dignified mien. He was 
simply but curiously dressed in a loose-fitting traveling costume; a 
long kaftan, richly trimmed and lined with the costly silver-fox fur 
of Russia, hung on a chair nbardiimf an embroidered traveling cap 
lay on a little table by his side. Ho ‘•was bending toward Madame 
Zophee when Gilbert entered ; he w^s sitting very near to her, his 
eyes fixed earnestly upon her face, and his hand, which was large 
and very white, and glittering like a woman’s with splendid jewels, 
lay upon hers with an eager pressure witif which he seemed to em- 
phasize his low, earnest words. He looked haughtily round as the 
door opened, an expression of surprise and indignation flitting over 
his face, and then he sat upright, paused in his conversation, and 
drew back his hand from where it had rest-M upon hers. 

Gilbert paused too, but only for a moiicent; and then, with a 
slight bow to the stranger, and a murmxir of “pardon” in the 
French tongue, which he took for granted would be understood, he 
advanced into the room, held out his band as usual to Madame 
Zophee, and said in English, in his cleaf^Vrank tones. “ Am 1 dis- 
turbing you? 1 beg your pardon. I clfid not know you had a vis- 
itor, but — ” 

And then he stopped again. TherCcS^as something in her counte- 
nance so unusual, so perplexing to Ir^, that he started, drew back 
his extended hand, and looked with asitonishment and consternation 
from her to her unknown friend. Th^> latter had drawn himself up 
stiffly, had glanced at Gilbert, and h^ then looked away, averting 
his eyes indifferently, looking ove^A^ie mountain view from the win- 
dow, and awaiting, with a hau??nt.y expression of impatience and 
surprise on his face, for this interruption to end. 

IMadame Zophee, when Gilbert turned to her, looked extremely 
embarrassed. She put out her hand with a deprecative gesture 
toward him, and stopped him instantly when he began to speak in 
his hasty, eager manner agai^. She rose, and a curious look of 
hesitation and perplexity camlb into her eyes. She glanced at the 
new-comer and back again (Xo her fiiend. Her cdieeks were glow- 
ing, Gilbert saw no-^-, ^^'^she stood up in the full light— glowing 
with a flush of Wtense excitement; and her eyes were sparkling and 
flashing changeful lights; and a curious smile, very wistful 

and very '^ad, curled her lip for a moment as she looked up at Gil- 
bert, st-v^nding there in his astonishment, and as she put up her hand 
to hi with a silencing gesture again. “Hush!” her lips formed 


THE SUK-MAID. 


160 

the word as she shook her head, and smiled with that wistful look 
into his face. He could not read the smile, he could not interpret 
her fflance: it only puazled him further; for how could he realize 
that it said— “ Farewell ”? It was for an instant that the two re- 
mained ihus; and then she turned, still standing, to her visitor, and 
said with excessive courtesy, indeed almost with reverence, a few 
words in her own Russian tongue. 

I’he stranger bowed stiffly in answer, and apparently in consent, 
for he turned to Gilbert, then, and bent his head very slightly 
toward him with a haughty, condescending bow, while Madame 
Zophee said in French, “ Sir Gilbert Erie— His Highness the Grand 
Duke George; permit me to present you to him;” and" Gilbert 
bowed also at length, trying not to show how put out and indig- 
nant he felt. 

The condescending salutation which greeted him was almost too 
much for his equanimity, how;ever, at that point. It was almost in 
vain that he struggled to still the ruffled sense of irritation and per- 
plexity within his mind, and to overcome the strong inclination he 
experienced to be as rude to Madame Zophee’s visitor, as he w^aa 
bound to be polite. How he hated the man— that was all he realized 
as yet — the proud, condescending, arrogant-looking fellow, who 
had sat so near to her when Gilbert entered, and who had dared to 
lay his hand upon hers. How he hated him ! And yet he had to obey 
her lead, and to follow the direction of her imploring glance, and to 
bow low and gravely as t he duke addressed him a few distant words 
in French. In truth, th‘^ grand-ducal personage was much and most 
justly irritated on his' side, much disgusted at being interrupted, 
offended at the intrusion of a stranger during his visit, and not at 
all inclined to extend liisf acquaintance at that moment to this 
brusque 5'oung English h\^ntsman who treated his presence with so 
little concern. He bowe(^ to the young man, and (having addressed 
a few words to him)* turned to i(ladame Zophee, made a sign with 
his hand, of half commani^ half courteous request, that she would 
take her seat by him againl'^'^hen, glancing at Gilbert with an ex- 
pression that meant evident dismissal, he went on with his remarks 
in Russian to his hostess, and. continued speaking as if Gilbert were 
not standing in a fume of indignation in the middle of the room. 

Gilbert felt strangely angry ruffled, and a good deal out of 
countenance besides. He was Mt at all clear as to how he should 
behave, and he felt upon an utterly unknown field. With a lady, 
were she empress or flower girl, Ue could have quickly found his 
ground : chivalrous courtesy, native grace, would have come to his 
assistance, however unexpected and astonishing the position might 
be. But a man who did not shake h^m by the hand or express pleas- 
ure at his acquaintance, or give liirnKy-n opening in any language for 
a single cordial speech, utterly non-pfaissQ;'’. him, and he drew him- 
self up in his turn, looked away wheh^ -J yjiad made his salutation, 
and he held out his hand to Madame Zophee- with a proud and in- 
dignant air. ^ 

” Good-by,” he said, at the first pause in the grand >^duke’s re- 
marks. ” 1 see 1 disturb you.” 

Good-by,” she said, hastily, once more putting up her lidud to 
silence him as he would speak again. ” We will meet in the eyeu- 


THE SUN-MAID. 161 

wg at your aunt’s— yes, surely,” she added, in a quick whisper in 
-Lnglish, for she could not bear that he should be offended, and go 
Away with that angry, hurt expression on his face. 

“ 1 do not know,” he answered, almost roughly to her, as he turned 
awa 5 % for he was quite unreasonable just then. He could not gather 
himself at all together, understand what he saw, what had happened 
to him, or, above all, what it was he felt beating within his eager 
heart with a pulse so fierce and strange. He thought it was anger 
as he left her, and broke away suddenly from the room. ^ 


CHAPTER XIX. 

A DUCAL VISITOR. 

Gilbert soon heard who had arrived for Pau was full of it, and 
people were talking of nothing else upon the Place. By the Paris 
train at two o’clock — his arrival merely heralded by a telegraphic 
message, received a few hours previously, to secure his rooms— had 
come no less a^ personage than the Grand Duke George Serge 
Hicolaievitch, with suite of many servants, secretaries and super- 
numerary attendants, on a flying visit to the Beainais capital, and to 
the coteaux of the Pyrenees. 

Paul was in ecstasies of agitation and excitement when Gilbert 
found his way to the Place. The prefet was promenading there, 
awaiting his admission to an audience, which he had ceremoniously 
requested on the grand duke’s arrival at the hotel ; and, while he 
waited, mysterious whispered confidences were being exchanged be- 
tween him and several of the most important residents and visitors 
as to the various entertainments and festivities that would be prob- 
ably consequent on the grand duke's stay among them. The old 
Prince Edward of Furst held the prefet tightly by one arm; Lord 
Charles Bently, one of the oldest English inhabitants of much im- 
portance, clung eagerly to the other; and the three paced up and down 
upon the boulevard with hasty and excitable steps, absorbed in a 
conversation upon schemes and projects. Valuable fragments of 
their talk were wafted on the breeze to old Jeffereys and sundry 
other secondary luminaries who perambulated in the orbit of the 
prefet and the Prince of Furst as closely as etiquette and courtesy 
allowed. They heard enough to make them welcome and important 
visitors at every tea-table in the community for the whole of that 
afternoon. The prefet had vast projects of doing honor to their 
august guest, and to their town. A banquet was talked of, and 
an official ball suggested at the Prefecture. A few private dinners, 
too, were to be given by magnates specially selected for this honor 
from among the visitors, with due regard to their position and 
purse. In fact, Pau was alive all that afternoon with projects, 
consideration, and excitement; and a brilliant vista of renew'ed 
festivity and gala stretched before the delighted eyes of society. 

Doomed, alas! were all these anticipations to utter and universal 
disappointment. The grand duke had not come to Pau for gayety, 
or to receive official entertainment, but apparently on some pri- 
vate mission of his own. He kept the prefet waiting a long time 
6 


THE SUN -MAID. 


162 

on the Place that first afternoon while he refreshed himself, as it 
was said, from the fatigue and dust of his journey ; and it was only 
known to his own attendants and to one or two higher functionaries 
of the hotel, who were properly discreet and silent, and to Gilbert 
Erie, who said almost nothing on the subject — to these only it was 
known that the Grand Duke George spent that afternoon (while 
the prefet waited his audience) in close conversation with Madame 
Zophee in her rez-de-chaussee salon in tbe hotel. 

Gilbert said nothing indeed, except, “Oh, yes, 1 have seen the 
fellow!” which remark he emitted in tones of great impatience and 
disgust when Jeffereys had rushed up to him in much importance 
with the information. “ I have seen him,” he said, and then he 
turned away. 

And he went off to his rooms, and spent a very uncomfortable 
time, fuming and chafing and working himself up into excitement 
and indignation against Madame Zophee, who had “ turned him 
up,” as he expressed it to himself, “ unexpectedly, and for so un- 
known and mysterious a cause, the moment any other fellow came 
on the scene.” He had not the least idea what had really angered 
him. It never occurred to him how many “ fellows ” had been 
about all winter, and that, except himself, she had scarcely made 
acquaintance with any one among them all. No one, indeed, dur- 
ing all these months had interfered with him: no one had disturbed 
Him in his tranquil, happy appropriation of Madame Zophee for him- 
self . And this was now all that was the matter with him ; at long 
last, some one had come between them, some one had stood before 
him in her consideration this afternoon— that stern-faced stranger, 
whose titles and position, and language and mien, were all so in- 
comprehensible, so irritating, and perplexing to him; this tall,, 
haughty man had thrown his presence, like a grim shadow, across 
the sunlit patii between Gilbert and his friend. 

This was what had happened to him, and he was very angry and 
very miserable indeed. He would not see any one that afternoon. 
What did he care, he 5 aid to himself, if Madame Zophee would not 
see him — for all these gabbling people on the Place down there? 
They all seemed to consider this confounded Hussian duke as a 
beatific visitor from celestial spheres, to be received and worshiped 
with unparalleled glories; and he — he hated the very sound of his 
name. He would have nothing to say to it all. They might give 
their balls and their dinners and their banquets at the Prefecture, for 
all he cared, but they neecl not expect him to be among the guests. 
He was far too angry and sore, too hurt in his native dignity, to 
think of such a thing. He sat down finally at his window, after 
divesting himself of his hunting-coat, lighted a solitary pipe, and 
puffed huge volumes from his lips as a valve for his excitement, 
and execrated his Russian enemy in epithets of mental vituperation 
as unreasonable as they were undeservetl. He was nearly as angry 
with Madame Zophee when he fimt came in as with the duke; but,. 
^ he sat and smoked there all alone, blowing his soft snowy clouds 
into the air, his anger for her cooled away somehow, and he thought 
of her a great deal, with a curious excitement stirring him, and with 
some feeling, very unfamiliar, throbbing in a strange fever in his 
heart. He ceased to be angry with her, and assured himself he was 


THE SUH-MAID. 


m 

^nly vexed and irritated generally — with the grand duke, with the 
fuss people made about him, and with the way things had turned 
out that day. He would not go to his aunt’s or anywhere else, he 
resolved, however, for he should hear of no one but that odious 
grand duke discussed unceasingly by everybody from side to side. 

He had to go out to get some dinner presently, and this he sought 
for himself at the club. There Jeffereys found him again, caught 
him by the button-hole, and told him, with much eloquent lament, 
that their hopes were blighted, that no balls or banquets, or grand 
official dinners were coming off, after all, for the Duke George re- 
fused to be entertained. 

“ Shows his sense!” satd Gilbert, with most reprehensible churlish- 
ness, as he abstracted himself promptly from Jefterey’s friendly 
hold. ‘‘The best thing I have heard about him yet,” he added. 
“ And now — 1 beg your pardon — 1 am going to dinner;” and then, 
in misanthropic solitude, he sat down at a little table in a corner, as 
far as possible away. 

He had scarcely finished, when a note reached him, brought by 
Baptiste to the club-door; one such as he had often had on previous 
evenings — three-cornered, sweet-scented, and with the “Violette” 
monogram and coronet of his aunt. It was a small note, but crossed 
from end to end, and therefore lengthy. The contents ran : 

“ My dearest Boy,— What has become of you? Why have 
you not appeared for dinner? Wicked, dissipated child! You are, 
I have no doubt, enjoying yourself immensely at that horrid club. 
The ruin of you all, as I have told Morton at least fifty times: tlie 
thing that unfits you for domestic life. Come in, dear child, with- 
out fail after dinner immediately. 

” 1 need not ask if you have heard the news, for le vieux Jeffereys 
tells me tliat you have seen the great man. When, how, my dear 
child, and where? Have you heard now that he refuses to be en- 
tertained officially, and that the prefetis in despair? I am sorry for 
poor dear Madame de Frontignac — it is, of course, a disappointment ; 
but 1 do not wonder that S. A. I. prefers privacy and repose. 1 dare 
say he has little of either at St. Petersburg. But though society is 
disappointed, we have much to talk about; for in our own little 
coterie, in a very quiet and select way, the grand duke does not re- 
fuse to be amused. That sweet, dear woman, Madame Perigonde 
Zemidoff , whom 1 knew well in Paris, the daughter of the emperor’s 
premier chamberlain, has spoken to S. A. 1. of Leon and me, and 
so he sent his card to us by his aid-de-camp on his arrival this after- 
noon. Leon has had an audience; he consents to come to us for the 
English luncheon to-morrow, and we have sundry little projects for 
his entertainment in view. Of course, to the Princess he has al- 
ready paid a visit of ceremony and compliment, and she comes in 
this evening to consult with me as to what we shall all do. 

“ 1 have not seen dear Zophee yet, so I do not know if she has 
heard of his arrival ; but, as the brother of her emperor, his visit will 
doubtless interest even her composed little mind. I wonder if she 
has ever seen him! These great people in Russia, as I am told, do 
not run about (as they do with us in London) in the public streets. 
This evening, however, as Zophee is also coming, we shall discuss 


THE SUN'-MA.ID. 



the matter fully, and compare notes of our impressions of the grand 
duke. 1 envy you j^our ‘ first view/ for he has gone to bed. 1 hear, 
already for this evening, and we shall none of us behold him till 
to-morrow. Come early, Gilberto mio, or 1 shall never forgive you.. 
Atoi, “ViOLETTE DE St. HiLAIRE.” 

So all Pau was disappointed, and Gilbert was very glad. He would 
not go to his aunt’s, however; he had made up his mind to that. 
He felt a little better, now that he had eaten his dinner and had 
smoked a good deal, and consoled himself with the reflection that 
this horrid Russian was not going to torment him in the role of 
“ hero for public worship ” during the next three days; but still he 
would not go to the Hotel St. Hilaire. Madame Zophee had not 
been nice to him, there was no doubt about it. She had been altered, 
stiff, cold, constrained, altogether — certainly, not at all what he con- 
sidered “nice” — in the presence of her sovereign’s brother, that 
afternoon. So he would not go to meet her at the Rue de Lycee; 
indeed, he did not seem to want to meet her just then at all. 

He wanted to be alone still ; to think and to dream back over the 
winter they had just spent together; to clear his mind, and to cool 
his throbbing heart, and to understand it all— what had befallen him, 
what he felt, what he desired. 

So he went home, and in his own little sitting-room, where he had 
never yet spent a single evening since he had come to Pau, he 
speedily became extremely dull. He could not smoke any more, 
and soon he was tired after all his excitement and his anger and agi- 
tation, and he could not think any more at all. He became sad and 
depressed, and very lonely for want of companionship, and his 
evening hung heavy on his hands — he wanted sympath}’-, too — some 
one with whom to talk about it all ; he knew he could get hold of 
nobody, and he felt quite disconsolate. 

Suddenly the idea seized him that it would be some comfort at 
least to write a letter — to scribble out upon paper all these curious 
conflicting feelings and memories and thoughts that were eddying 
with such confusion in his brain ; and he sat down forthwith, opened 
his writing-book, and soon lost sense of time or loneliness or trouble, 
as in rapid writing he covered page after page. 

He wrote, of course, to his only correspondent — to his mother^ 
He wrote in a new and curious vein of description and reminiscence, 
making revelations which he had before concealed ; making, indeed, 
confessions of which he was scarcely aware. He wrote, because 
he felt the need to write — of just one subject— of Madame Zophee, 
of their friendship, of her loneliness, of her veiled and mysterious 
history, of her interest and her charm. Very unconsciously he 
wrote it all, scarcely knowing that he was telling his mother any- 
thing unievealed before. 

He was quite unconscious, when he inscribed his name, with 
much sense of relief in the whole achievement, at the corner of the 
last of many pages, that in all these glowing, hastily- written lines 
there lay, full and clear, drawn in bright, forcible colors, the picture 
of his heart. 

He did not send the letter that night, however, but left it unfolded 
between the leaves of his writing-book; and then he went oft to bed^ 


THE SUH-MAID. 


165 


CHAPTER XX. 

REALIZATION. 

The luncheon of which the grand duke consented to partake at 
the Hotel St. Hilaire was of the most private description ; only the 
Princess and the family of the marquis, and Monsieur and Madame 
de Frontignac, in their unofficial capacity, being requested to attend. ~ 

Gilbert avoided it, being extremely annoyed at an early hour of 
the day to find that Madame Zophee had gone out driving, no one 
knew where, but somebody reported, “ to the chalet.” He saw her 
returning late in the afternoon, her victoria swinging rapidly into 
the court-yard, as he prowled gloomily upon the boulevard; but be- 
fore he could cross the Place to the hotel she had passed, witfioufe 
observing him, within the glass doors into the hall. Instinctive 
courtesy forbade him attempting to follow her through the crowd 
of porters and hotel attendants that stood round. He went back dis- 
consolately to the Place again, and saw Marfa close her window' 
above him, thus taking away every chance of her appearing among^ 
her flowers on her balcon}’^ there. He was quite disgusted. 

After sauntering half an hour backward and forward, taking his 
hat ofl[ with gloomy discouragement of conversation to many ac- 
quaintances, he resolved to penetrate her seclusion, and to trespass 
upon their habitual etiquette, by going to visit her, as he had once 
done at the chalet, without any sort of excuse. 

And in he went, and along the corridor; but only to be disap- 
pointed and rendered more indignant than he had yet been. Ivan 
and the attendant of the grand duke were at the far window, -as be- 
fore; and this time — doubtless mindful of a sharp reprimand on 
account of yesterday’s disturbance — the latter advanced without 
waiting for Ivan to interfere, and with much courtesy, but with 
equal determination, interrupted Gilbert’s approach. 

“ His Highness the Grand Duke George-Serge-Nicolaievitch pays 
Madame Zophia Petrovna Variazinka a visit,” he said, gravely; 
adding, in rather peremptory tones, as Gilbert hesitated in his re- 
treat, ” No one is permitted to enter, monsieur, while His Highness 
is there.” 

AVith a smothered oath and an exclamation, in broad English, of 
anger and vexation, Gilbert conquered, somehow, his impulse to 
knock the man down, then turned on his heel suddenly, and walked 
away. 

“ The last time,” he muttered to himself, in fuming indignation, 

“ the very last time 1 will try to get in at that door!” 

Ah ! if he had known how true his words were, he would have 
spoken them, perhaps, in softer accents with a different thought. 

On his dressing-table, when he went home, he found a little note, 
addressed in a clear, delicate writing unknown to him. 

He opened it, and to his surprise he found it was from the Prin- 
cess. An invitation was contained in it — one that he was well 
aware could not with any courtesy be refused. The Princess asked 


166 


THE SUH-MAID. 


him to spend the evening with her, quite en petit comite, to meet the 
grand duke and a few veiy familiar friends. Hermannricht was 
coming to play to them, she said, and their young Swedish friend 
Would sing, and it would be quite friendly and sociable, just what 
the gr^d duke liked, and “ would Sir Gilbert be so very amiable as 
to come?” 

Of course he went; and at the very door his aunt greeted him 
with much excitement and delight. She was taking off her cloak 
and the soft light hood that had covered her head as she walked 
round from her own house, and she was being deharfassee, as she 
had learned to express it, by Baptiste of her over-shoes, when her 
nephew walked in, and she accosted him in the vestibule at once. 

“ You dear, naughty child! Where have you been? Not a sight 
have 1 seen of you all day, and you never came to luncheon; and, 
of course, you have not heard, and it is all so interesting, only 1 
cannot make anything of it. Only fancy, the grand duke is one of 
our little Zophee’s greatest friends, and has known her all her life, 
and knows all about her; only, of course, as he says nothing more, 
no one dares to ask him, and we are not much the wiser, my dear, 
after all; but still it is very interesting and satisfactory. And then, 
the duke is so delighted with Pau, and he is such a charming man, 
dear child; and he talks of coming back next year for the whole 
winter, and of taking a villa; only then, of course, he will bring — 
Coming, coming. Leon. Yes, Baptiste has finished at last. Come 
along, "Gilbert, come in with me. But no, not your arm; 1 must 
make a state entry, and take your uncle’s. 'Come along;” and then 
in they went. 

It was a pleasant evening, after all, too; though for a long while 
Gilbert cherished his ill-humor, and tried to dislike everybody — to 
be stiff to Madame Zophee and odious to the grand duke. But that 
important personage being, in fact, except when disturbed and ir- 
ritated, a very amiable and agreeable man, got the better of Gilbert 
and his ill-temper, and drew him into conversation upon subjects, 
British and familiar, quite in spite of himself. 

Madame Zophee was sitting near the duke, in an inner and special 
circle where Gilbert could not reach her; but she looked so lovely in 
her rich, curious dress, and smiled so sw^eetly, and indeed, implor- 
ingly, into his clouded face, that he felt obliged to forgive her too. 

He accepted the state of things with resignation for the moment, 
and made himself quite agreeable to the grand duke. His High- 
ness, indeed, held him for a long time in conversation, inquiring 
for relations of his mother — Deninghams — who had been at the 
British embassy at S^. Petersburg for many years, and asking with 
cordial interest whether Gilbert himself had no taste toward diplo- 
matic life; and, whife they talked thus, Ihe feeling of irritation and 
soreness in Gilbert’s heart seemed for the time being to wear away. 

It fired up again, however, as the duke turned at length. from him, 
and took his seat again by Madame Zophee’s side. The Princess was 
occupied at another part of the room with her assembling guests, 
and so the duke began to converse with Madame Zophee in Russian, 
and in low and very friendly tones. 

Then Hermannricht played, and all hushed their voices to listen; 
and Gilbert, finding a chair not very far from Madame Zophee’s 


THE SUX-MAID. 


167 


side, sat down and set himself just to look at her in silence, to try to 
control his irritation, to gather his mind together, to sift his senti- 
ments and at long last to realize. For it was looking silently at her 
thus that evening that he did realize. 

Feeling how his heart thrilled, and his cheek flushed, and his eyes 
suffused with sweet, intense emotion as he met her glance; feeling 
how desolate he was, now circumstances forbade him sitting by her 
side, and hearing her converse in low murmurs, under cover of the 
music and the laughing voices, throughout the whole evening only 
to him; feeling his misery without her, his eager craving to hear 
her voice address him, to speak her name once more; feeling the 
mad, bitter jealousy that filled him of any other man who dared 
absorb her in his stead; feeling all this, he realized, and watched 
her quietly, jealously, but very furtively now. 

And he soon went away : it was of no use, he told himself. It 
was not, as he knew, her fault, but she could not speak to him, and 
he would have no opportunity to-night to speak to her; so he went 
away, much more happy and contented now, for he had formed his 
resolution — formed it strongly, deeply, and quietly; he had reached 
at long last the kernel of his own sweet secret, ^and he hud nothing 
more to realize about himself. 

They would meet to-morrow — he had learned so much before he 
left the Princess’ rooms. Many plans had been formed and arrange- 
ments made of which he had heard nothing in his misanthropical 
solitude of that whole day. His aunt and Morton had much to tell 
him of the projects for the remainder of the w^li. Madame Zophee 
was going back to the chalet early in the mornmg of the following 
day; and, after the French breakfast in the forenoon, they were all 
to join her there— to drive over with the Princess, and the grand 
duke, and all their usual coterie of selected friends. From the gate 
of the chalet they were to ride ca ponies to the summit of one of the 
coteaux, from which the grand duke would enjoy a splendid mount- 
ain view. They were to partake of a picnic tea up there, as the 
guests of the Marquis de St. Hilaire; and then they would return 
home by the chalet, to find their carriages again; and^ so by sunset, 
and in time for the Comte de Beaulieu’s dinner, come home. Only 
Madame Zophee was to remain at the chalet, for which sh&had gone 
to make arrangements in the morning, when Gilbert had missed her 
at the hotel ; and then, on the day following the morrow she v:as to 
receive the grand duke, in company with all her kmd bt. Hilaire 
friends at a luncheon, that was to be as Russian in its characteris- 
tics as the combined efforts of Ivan and Marfa and Vasilie could 
succeed in making it. No part of this programme made much im- 
pression upon Gilbert’s mind, except the fact that they were all to p 
over to the chalet to see Madame Zophee, and to ride with her to the 
Chapelle of P— to-morrow. That one point took possession of him, 
and he fixed upon it as the occasion which he courted, the opportun- 
ity which would suit his purpose, the one central, supreme rnonient 
of his existence, for which as he went home now, he resolved to 

^ Then, strange to say, as he strolled along the Rue de Lycee in the 
clear moonlight, and looked up into the deep intense blue of the 
southern sky, and as he turned into his own court-yard, and went 


# 


THE SUN-MAID. 


168 

upstairs slowly to his room, the thoughts that came to him with 
curious, sudden foi’ce were less of Madame Zophee than of his 
mother. The memory of her, in her stern, grim solitude, at Erie’s 
Lynn came strongly across him, and the feeling rose quickly within 
his heart of her lenderness for him ; that tenderness which, as he 
well knew, was the single attection of her strong, isolated heart— the 
utter devotion of a love quite undivided. How tar his heart had 
gone from her, he suddenly realized, and she was so little aware! 
His conscience smote him, all woke up as were his keen feelings 
into sensitive and quivering life, and, as he went into his room, the 
resolution took him that he would now be so quick and ready with 
his frank confidence in her. that she would never have any real 
cause to upbraid him or to complain. He knew his secret himself 
only now, and not an hour would he conceal it from her. 

He walked to his writing-table, and drew forth the letter which 
he had written yesterday evening. He gathered up the long loose 
sheets in his hand together, and read them from beginning to end. 
And as he did so, smiles flitted again and again over his face — 
smiles of intense sweetness, of happiness, of much amusement. He 
had written all this.unconsciously last night; and now it all seemed 
so natural to him, onl}" so very strange that he had never realized it 
before. One page remained uncovered on the last sheet, and he took 
his pen up quietly, when he had finished his perusal, smoothed the 
paper in front of him, and, after a moment's pause, he wrote: 

“My dearest Mother,— Once more 1 resume. 1 have some- 
thing yet to tell ymi — something for which, I think, from all that 
comes before, jmu will not be wholly unprepared. You are the first 
— the mry first, believe me — to whom 1 tell my secret, and you must 
receive it with confidence in me strong enough to assure you of the 
full fitness of what 1 do. I feel for Madame Zophee Yariazinka as 
1 have never felt for any woman in this world before. 1 believe her 
to be better than any one I have ever known. Indeed, all that she is 
or does seem perfection to me; and as for you, she cannot fail to 
satisfy you in every possible respect. So there is no more to say, 
mother, except that I hope this announcement will be a cause of 
happiness to you, for I love her with my whole heart and life and 
soul ; and to-morrow 1 will ask her to be my wife. 

“ Your devoted son, Gilbert Erle.'” 


CHAPTER XXI. 

BRIGHT HOPE AND RUFFLED TEMPER. 

It was a spring afternoon of peculiar loveliness and enchantment 
when the driving party reached the gate of the chalet at the top of 
the sloping coteaux the next day. The drive had been beautiful. 
The glare was softened by white flitting clouds, and the sun-rays 
had fallen pleasantly upon them as they "drove across the Gave; past 
the oak groves of Juran^on; between the sloping vineyards above 
Gelos: up the hill-sides ; tnrough shady and well-wooded valleys; 
and between fields green as the emerald with the fresh vivid hues of 
the spring, and gemmed with innumerable flowers. Cowslips, vio- 


THE SUH-MAIH. 


169 

lets, bluebells, scarlet anemones, and delicate narcissus were all 
blooming now with rich luxury in wonderful and beautiful pro- 
fusion. The grand duke was in great good humor, and Gilbert’s 
spirits were at their highest pitch. He had made up his mind com- 
pletely, and he was troubled with no hesitation, little diffidence, and 
less doubt. He was the life of the party in his aunt’s carriage, in 
which a place had been allotted to him, and he had evinced an ex- 
uberance of merriment during the drive that verged almost to ex- 
citement, and caused the marquise to glance once or twice at his 
flushed cheek and sparkling eyes with surprise. He was so ridicu- 
lously happy, as he would have himself described it, that he “ really 
did not know what to do.” 

At the chalet they all dismounted. There was Madame Zophee 
ready to receive them; and there was a group of hardy little mount- 
ain ponies, collected from St. Hilaire, from the De Yeuils, and by 
contribution from different neighbors — some fetched specially for 
the occasion from the Eaux-Bonnes. Besides these, there were two 
low wicker carriage#, drawn by stout Spanish mules, ready to convey 
such members of the expedition as were disinclined to embark upon 
equestrian feats. Of these last were Madame de Beaulieu and the 
marquise herself. The marquis drove the first named lady; and 
Baron Keffel, possessing himself of whip and reins, started, full of 
valorous enterprise, as the protector of the latter. The princess pre-^ 
ferred to ride; and when she had been fairly mounted by Gilbert and 
Morton, who both came forward to hold her stirrup and reins, the 
rest of the expedition arranged themselves, and in a few minutes 
they were all winding in a long column through “the flowering 
valley of St. Hilaire,” beyond the first coteau, upward as if to reach 
the snow -clad 'pic that shot like a silver arrow, far above their heads,, 
into the blue of the Spanish sky. 

The view was glorious as they rode, the coloring rich and vivid,, 
the glow warm and intense. The valleys and gentle slopes nestling 
in their garments of fresh verdure soon lay beneath them, and the 
country opened out grandly on every side. Verdant glades, fiowery 
fields, and woody hollows stretched beneath their gaze; and beyond 
all, and looming ever in the vast prospect above all, towered the 
mountains — shoulder above shoulder, pic above pic, range beyond 
range — standing, clear down, in snowy outline against the azure 
heavens. All delightful so far; weather perfect, scenery magnifi- 
cent, the ponies excellent and willing, picking their way cheerily 
along, and all the right people there, in well-balanced numbers, 
sufficient both of Amazons and cavaliers— a thoroughly well- 
organized picnic, in fact, as all social arrangements infallibly turned 
out to be with Which Madame la Marquise de St. Hilaire had any- 
thing to do. 

And yet, from the moment that the}^ started from the chalet gar- 
den, Gilbert’s exuberant spirits had undergone, suddenly and em- 
phatically, a change. Nothing fell out, in fact, just as he wanted 
it. He had painted a certain bright vision in his imagination in pros- 
pect of this riding party to the Chapelle de P . A picture of 

himself winding "up the slopes and througli the valleys on foot (as 
for all the distance he had thought he would much prefer), walking 
by the side of Madame Zophee’s pony, leading it carefully over the 


THE SUH MAID. 


170 

rough places of the way; he telling her, as they went, and as he 
skillfully moderated the pace of her steed to suit his ideas— telling 
her all the story of that newly discovered secret of his, and asking 
from her an answer to that question which had suddenly become of 
first, indeed single, importance in his heart. 

And here he was, winding up the valley by the side of Miss Ida de 
Yeuil, a very nice girl in her way certainly, but not in the least the 
person whom he wished for his companion on that particular day; 
and there was Madame Zophee riding far in front of him, the grand 
duke close by her bridle, both just behind Morton, who, in his char- 
acter of host in the expedition, rode by the princess, and acted as 
their guide. 

The grand duke, Gilbert’s inevitable bugbear at this particular 
time, had brought all this misarrangemeiit about by inviting Madame 
Zophee, with a grave«bow, as they left the chalet, to be his compan- 
ion for the ride; and he had taken his place beside her, and moved 
on at once, conversing continuously in Russian, without taking any 
notice of Gilbert, whom he left standing by hife pony in despair. 
“ There was no help for it,” so Madame Zophee had tried tto say in 
a kind glance as she turned away to join the duke, deserting Gilbert, 
who had just gathered up and given her her rein. But “no help 
for it ” did not reconcile him to his disappointment, and he rode by 
Mademoiselle de Veuil in a gloomy and suddenly clouded mood 
that was scarcely covered by her ceaseless and easy chatter. He was 
bitterly disappointed, for this was a reverse of fortune which it had 
never occurred to him to expect. As they rode on and the path 
narrowed, they dropped into single file, and Mademoiselle de Veuil, 
thinking ” Sare Geelbert ” curiously unpleasant to-day, betook her- 
self to conversation with the cavalier in front of her, leaving Gilbert 
to his own reflections, and to recover his temper as best he could. 
The result was that he did not recover it, irritation, impatience, and 
disappointment getting more and more the better of him as he rode. 
Solitude was not the best cure for the anger and jealousy and 
passionate feeling of misery that gradually again filled his heart. He 
got worse and worse as he went along, until it all seemed too much 
for him, and was ready in any sort of way to overflow. 

In this condition, at the end of an hour’s riding, he reached, with 
the long column of explorers, the summit of the hill, and they all 
paused a moment before dismounting, and stood together in a group, 
admiring and gazing over the glorious prospect, each uttering (every 
one in his own tongue) loud exclamations of delight. Gilbeit in- 
stantly threw himself from his pony, saying nothing in any way to 
echo the cries of admiration that surrounded him. He flung his 
reins to a servant of Morton’s, who stood near in readiness, and he 
walked straight through the group of riders to Madame Zophee’s 
side. She was still upon her pony, and close to her stood the grand 
duke, who had dismounted from his. The princess was near also; 
and Morton, having slipped off duty and found his way to the back- 
ground and to the neighborhood of his little Jeanne, the princess sat 
now on her pony, a little apart for a moment, and alone. The duke, 
observing this, just as Gilbert approached, turned toward her, and 
conversation began between them with some remarks in German 
upon the splendor of the view. Madame Zophee was therefore sit- 


THE SUN-MAID. 


171 

ting silent in her saddle when Gilbert reached her pony’s side. It 
was a moment, a single fleeting moment, which he seized to speak. 
He came close to her, he put his hand up and laid it eagerly on her 
pony’s neck, and he turned toward her with the expression on his 
face which it had worn for the last hour, of impatience, vexation, 
and misery — all very new to him. 

“ Sir Gilbert! what is the matter?” said Madame Zophee, smiling 
alrnost with amusement at the temper and excitement in his face, 
which for an instant she put down to boyish jealousy and to the 
childish impatience which he so often evinced at anything which 
came across his will. ” What are you looking so indignant about?” 

” Why do j’^ou ask me?” he said; “ you know quite well. 1 can- 
not stand it any more. 1 hate that Russian fellow, and 1 will not 
have him riding by you all day.” 

“ Hush!” she exclaimed, hastily, looking anxiously round lest his 
eager words had been overheard. “Hush, Sir Gilbert! you must 
not speak in that way.” 

But 1 will!” he went on. “1 cannot stand the man, with his 
airs and his patronage, so coolly thinking he may walk off as he 
likes with you.” 

“ Sir Gilbert! Sir Gilbert! do not be so absurd,” she said, “ You 
are behaving like an angry boy. What do you mean?” 

“ 1 mean 1 will not have it. I want to ride with you. I have 
come on purpose to ride with you ; and what right has he to come 
between us and take you away like this? No one else has ever done 
it, and 1 will not stand i^ now.” 

“Sir Gilbert! what do you mean?” she said again. “Listen. 
The grand duke has been so kind to me, you do not know how kind, 
and it is for his wife’s sake, you know; all for the sake of old days 
when she remembers me a child. Do not be foolish. Sir Gilbert. 
Please go away now; 1 must, indeed, drive you away; so please go. 
See, you must not stand so close to him ; he has heard our voices; 
we must not speak so loud. Ah! he has finished talking with the 
Princess, and he is coming again to speak to me now.” 

“ 1 cannot stand it, and I am going away— back home again,” 
Gilbert exclaimed, in passionate tones. “ If it must be, 1 will leave 
you, as you wish it, and you drive me away, because 1 do not want 
to vex you, Madame Zophee, by being rude to this Russian, to this 
friend of yours. I do not want to do it; and as 1 feel now I think 
I might, so 1 will go. But stay, say good-by to me. When we 
meet again, 1 will not be angry as 1 am now. 1 will go away, for 1 
know I am making arfool of myself, but when 1 see you again 1 will 
have cooled down. Only say good-by to me, that 1 may not be 
quite miserable and desolate all the day long.” 

“ Sir Gilbert, how can you be so absurd?” she said, softly. 

“ What a boy you are!” 

“ 1 dare say you do think me a boy,” he answered, a little bitterly, 
and he took her hand in his, clasping it a moment in farewell. ‘^1 
dare say you do think me a boy,” he repeated, and as he spoke she 
looked up quickly into his face. 

His hand had closed upon hers, where it lay upon her pomrnel, 
with an eagerness and fervor in its touch that was quite new to him, 
and she would have drawn her hand away in astonishment, but he 


THE SUN'-MAID. 


172 

held it for that instant firm and tight. She looked up at him, and 
her lips quivered with a sudden start of mingled astonishment and 
dismay. Her eyes distended with a curious expression of surprise 
and deprecation too as they met his, resting upon her with that new 
light she had never seen in them before. A strange, wistful light it 
was. It combated for an instant his anger, his disappointment, and 
chagrin, and then it conquered them utterly, and his eyes suffused 
and glistened upon her, full of tenderness and eager love. 

“ Sir Gilbert! Sir Gilbert!” she whispered in a low voice that w^as 
tremulous with intense excitement and with pain, ‘ ‘ let me tell you 
something — now — quickly; let me tell it, I have been wanting to 
speak to you; I have been wishing to tell you for all these days 
past, but — ” 

” 1 will not hear what you would tell me,” he exclaimed, passion- 
ately, ” till you have listened to what I would say to you.” 

“ But 1 must— 1 must,” she said, her voice breaking with the 
weight of strange agony, in its low, suppressed tone. 

” Never mind^,” he said, hastily, for the grand duke approached 
to join her again. “Here he comes — the ruffian! but nevermind. 
We have a great deal to say, both of us, 1 dare say; but we shall 
meet again ere long. Good-by.” 

And then he turned and left her, and she recovered her compos- 
ure as best she could. How she spent that day, how she got through 
the long hours, with their weight of conversation and sight-seeing 
and etiquette, was one of those things she could never remember, 
and could never tell. 


CHAPTER XXli. 

ENCHANTMENTS BROKEN. 

Gilbert spent the day, on his side, in riding straight back to the 
chalet, in total disregard and oblivion of anything that convention- 
ality might demand from a member of a picnic. He forgot all about 
the picnic, indeed, and about everybody it included, save Madame 
Zophee. He forgot that he had promised his aunt to light the ffre, 
was indifferent who boiled the kettle, or what bon-inots were made 
by the baron as they sat on the grass at tea. He would have noth- 
ing to say to it all, as Madame Zophee would have so little to say to 
him. He would not linger, as one of that merry, laughing party, 
all the afternoon, to see another man, whosoever it might be, loung- 
ing by her side and riding by her pony, abs<^bing her smiles and 
enjoving her conversation; so he left them, disgusted and very mis- 
erable, but still quite resolved in his own mind. It did not much 
matter, he said, as he rode quickly down the valleys. He had his 
own deep-laid plan. 

It was well on in the afternoon when he reached the chalet. The 
servants were waiting there from St. Hilaire to take the tired ponies, 
and to one of them he gave his, bidding the man return with it to 
the chateau. Then he opened the gate into Madame Zophee’s garden. 

How richly spring was budding there! The turf was soft and 
green, the trees were bursting into leaf, the flowers were opening in 
starry blossoms all over the borders, and the roses were blooming 


THE SUN-MAID. 


173 

round the windows and the rustic porch. There was no one there. 
The place looked sweet and familiar to him, coming to it after all 
these winter months; hut it seemed curiously quiet this afternoon, 
for the men-servants were away on the mountain with their mistress, 
and Lustoff had gone round to the stable to enliven his solitude in 
the company ot the Belgian dog. 

The quiet stillness of the place fell softly over Gilbert’s ruffled 
spiiit, and he soon began to return slowly to a happier and more 
amiable mood. He wandered about the garden a little, looking at 
her rose-bushes one by one, thinking of the day when he had first 
come there and gathered the rich golden festoons for her, in all the 
glory of their latest bloom. He trod slowly backward and forward 
the particular pathway on which he knew she spent many a summer 
evening, pacing in her calm solitude in view of the mountain pics 
she loved. His mind was full very soon of numberless little happy 
reminiscences and thoughts of her, as ihe had come and gone in his 
sight, through all last autumn, in and out of this garden, and up 
and down the woody slopes to St. Hilaire; and he became quite 
happy, and composed, and satisfied in his heart, as time went on, as 
he wandered about and thought of her, and waited for her return. 

At last the sun began to set, and he felt tired of his wanderings. 
He realized that he had been sauntering on the soft turf for a long 
while; and he went and sat down then, just on the threshold of her 
window, resting his head back against the lintel, and letting his 
eyes wander idly over the deepening crimson flush of the sky. He 
forgot to smoke all this time; his mind and imagination were far 
too busy and full. He was thinking, and going over the thought 
again and again, how strange it was that he had never known be 
loved her all these long months through ; that he had been so happy, 
and never known the cause; that it had been glowing in his heart 
with the glory of a priceless jewel — his tender love — for many a 
day, as he now realized, and he had never found it out. She had 
been “ a part of the sunshine of St. Hilaire;” so he had once raid to 
his aunt, as he remembered, and he smiled to himself as he recol- 
lected suddenly the shrewdness of his aunt’s reply. For she — his 
little strange, sweet friend — had been in truth, not, as he had as- 
serted, a part of a universal sunshine, but the very source and center 
of that sunshine herself ; not only gilding for him with a golden 
glory, as he sat and dreamed there, Pau and the Pyrenees, the chalet 
and St. Hilaire, but all the world besides — all life, all future, and 
every changeful circumstance or scene to come. The moments fled 
rapidly as he sat lost in delicious reverie, his whole heart and soul 
bathed in the sweetness of that inner light. The morning of love 
had risen gloriously for him, and his life seemed flooded with the 
sunshine of anticipation and hope. 

Suddenly he started up. Voices were drawing near the gate. - 
Mingling voices, masculine and womanly, loud and low ; the whole 
party were returning; and at the same time the roll of wheels drew 
near. They would dismount at the gate of the garden (so much he 
knew), and" they would then get into their carriages, every one of 
them, and drive rapidly home. He would be well rid of them at 
last, he assured himself — of aunts and uncles, friends and cousins, 
Gtrangers and dukes. Such a lot of them; it had been really very 


THE SUH-MAID. 


174 

hard on him all the day. He felt angry again, quite ready for a 
fresh outburst, as the voices drew near; and then he suddenly 
obeyed an instinctive impulse, and drew out of sight of the gate,, 
away along a side shrubbery path round by the edge of the garden,, 
listening and waiting, and full of impatience, till that inevitable duke 
had said his last words and had driven away. He heard the words, 
in those full, rich Russian accents which had infuriated him so often 
during the last three days; he heard Madame Zophee’s tones in an- 
swer; he heard the Princess and his aunt calling out to her their kind 
words of “ good-night;” and then the welcome sound came of the 
roll of the carriages down the hill one after another, and the ring of 
the hoofs of Morton’s horse as he hastened after them, and cantered 
along in the hollow below by Jeanne de Veuil’s side. 

Then did Gilbert emerge from his seclusion, and come out upon 
the lawn, and along the pathway from the drawing-room toward 
the gate. Madame Zophee was leaning there, w atching her depart- 
ing friends. She had taken her hat off, and held it in one hand, 
while the other supported her cheek. She stood very still, her head 
drooping rattier wearily, her long dress sweeping the grass by her 
side. He drew near, treading softly, and had come half-way down 
the path before his footsteps fell on her ear. Then she started, turned 
suddenly, and saw him, and he sprung quickly forward before she 
could say one word. She paused, receded a step, and looked up at 
him : before she was aware of it , her hands were clasped firmly in 
his. 

They stood an instant in silence, and, quick as lightning and 
fleeting as the vivid flash, a gleam of uncontrollable feeling quiv- 
ered on her face. It was a smile answering his smile, and one glance 
from her shadowy eyes, giving back the love-light, eager, tender,, 
wistful, and passionate, that quivered under the dark lashes in the 
blue depths of his. Vivid, brilliant, and beautiful, her glance met 
hini, and thrilled with intense sweetness to his joyous heart — and 
then it vanished. 

“ Zophee, Zophee!” he had murmured, very earnestly and very 
low ; and at his voice the spell broke, the light fled from her eyes, 
and the smile on her lips changed instantly to a quiver of suffering 
and dismay. 

” Zophee!” he went on, retaining her two hands firmly within his 
own, and disregarding her feverish efforts to draw back from him 
and to turn away, ” Zophee, I have waited here the whole day long 
for 3 ^ou — to tell you — ah! you know what I have to say.” 

‘‘ flush, hush!” she cried in tones of bitterest anguish. “ Hush, 
Sir Gilbert! — Sir Gilbert, let me go away.” 

‘‘Nay, hear me!” he persisted. ” Are you surprised? 1 thought 
everybody knew it — that it was only my own heart that could be so 
foolish as not to know itself, only 1 who have been blind! You 
know, Zophee, how utterly I love 3 ’'ou!” he said. 

” Sir Gilbert! God forgive me! for the love of Heaven let me go!" 

” Ah, no! why leave me!” he persisted. ” Stay, hear me, let me 
tell it you again and again. It is so sweet to have realized it. 1 
love you, Zophee, I love you — and that is all 1 had to tell,” he 
added. 

It was in his light, frank, boyish way he uttered the last words. 


THE SUK-MAID. 


175 

and a sweet, sunny look glanced in his eyes again as he spoke, and 
Zophee turned her face from him, and wrested one of her trembling 
hands away, and covered her eyes with it that she miijht not see 
him, that the thrill of her heart, vibrating at his words and voice, 
might not break forth in her glance again, answering the love in his. 

“ Hush!” she said, at last, in passionate accents, with a voice full 
of strange anguish. “ Do not break my heart — do not madden me 
— do not cover me and crush me with remorse and bitterness and 
shame. Listen to Sir Gilbert, listen to me; and, it you can, 
forgive me, ’ ’ she cridff 

‘‘ Zophee, there is but one word I wish to hear from you,” he 
whispered, softly. 

“No, no! Hear me, hear me; you know nothing, you do not 
know what you say. Oh, God! what have I done? What have 1 
to tell you?” she cried, with passionate bitterness again. 

“ I care not what you have to tell me!” he exclaimed, in reply. 
“ Tell me notliing, Zophee. 1 wish to hear nothing of all you would 
conceal. 1 care not, I tell you, what 5 ^our history has been. 1 care 
only for you, and our life; all my hope is for the future, Zophee. 1 
care nothing for the past.” 

“ Hush, hush!” she cried again. “ Hear me. 1 must tell you of 
my life. I must tell you my whole history — yes, everything, every- 
thing. Then, who knows, you may — perhaps you may forgive. 
Come in, come in!” she added, suddenly, with a feverish and ex- 
cited manner, as if the struggle and the agony of her hidden trouble 
W'ere all too much for her, and as if she scarcely knew what she said. 
“ Come in, and I will lay before you the record of my life.” 

He followed her as she trod hastily up the pathway till they 
reached the window through which they had passed together the 
first time on that autumn evening six months ago, and then she 
paused and turned again toward him as he stood. She put up her 
hands suddenl}^ and clasped them together under her bending face, 
and a great sigh quivered and agonized her whole frame as she looked 
up an instant, and then bent her head in a strange attitude of sup- 
plication and huqiility; and he, troubled and perplexed at her agi- 
tation, said again, “ One word, Zophee, one word, my own sweet 
friend, so long my friend, now my dearest, my own, 1 hope — my 
love. A little word will be enough for me, and then if 1 distress 
you, Zophee, 1 will go. But must 1 leave you? not surely till I have 
liadmyword.” 

“ Forgive me, forgive me, is all — is all that 1 can say,” she mur- 
mured. 

“ Zophee!” he exclaimed again, and his tone was low and tremu- 
lous this time, and a sudden pallor came upon his cheek. “ What 
do you mean?” he said. 

“ Forgive me! what more can 1 say to you, dear, nay, beloved 
friend? Forgive, forgive! and hear me if you have patience to do 
so. Hear me, I know you will, for you are noble, you are tme and 
kind. You will hear me that you may forgive me, more and more 
forgive me as you hear, and that you may perhaps go away, leaving 
me, without bitter hatred in your heart.” 

“ Zophee, Zophee!” he cried then, for her words were inexplicable 


THE SUH-MAID. 


17C 

to him, but they pierced him, like poisoned arrows, with sharp, 
sudden pain. “ Leave you! what can you mean?” he cried. 

“ Hear me, and go,” she answered, her voice sinking to a broken 
whisper and her face bending upon her clasped hands. “It is all 
1 can say to you. Hear me, forgive me, and go. ” 

He was silent an instant, then an expression of strong feeling 
swept over his face. The light seemed to go suddenly out of it. 
The sunny look of youth changed, his smiling lips hardened and be- 
came stern. Full of perplexity and confusion, he stood silent, look- 
ing down upon her, dimly realizing the purport of her repeated 
words — the farewell that was in them, the dismissal she w'as strug- 
gling to imp^. 

‘ Do you mean that you do not love meV” he said, at length, 
very slowly, in a low and curiously altered tone. 

” No, no!” she exclaimed, the word escaping her lips hastily, be- 
fore she could arrest it or realize what she said. “Not that! no, 
no!” 

He caught her hand once more. 

“Then, in God’s name, look up, Zophee, and speak to me!” he 
exclaimed, his voice ringing again with passionate eagerness. “ An- 
swer me — answer me. Tell me you love me — my heart is break- 
ing!” he said. 

“ And mine!” she murmured, “ is broken — broken in grief for 
you, deal friend; and in worse than grief— in shame and agony of 
humiliation for mj^self. What have I done?” she continued, her 
composure breaking down again. “ What have I done? IMay God 
forgive me, if you never can!” and she hid her face once more. 

“ Will you speak to me?” he said, presently, in a low, painful 
tone, after waiting a moment in bitterness and perplexity. “1 am 
so miserable, Zophee. Can you not tell me what you have to say?’' 

“lam trying to speak,” she said — “trying to tell you. Come 
in, come in! 1 would tell you of my wdiole life. Sir Gilbert, but 
you will not hear me; and it is a long' weary story to tell.” 

“And 1 care not,” he exclaimed again, emphatically, “1 care 
not to hear it. Keep your life’s secret— keep it forever secret, 
Zophee, if you will. Tell me only,” he went on, passionately, “ tell 
me only what I want to hear from you; tell me only of — your love.” 

They had passed into the room together during the last words, 
and she had sat down by her writing-table, while he stood waiting 
by her side; and she hid her face and turned away from him, and 
he paused again and loolced silently down. Suddenly, as she sat 
there, her face buried in her hands, her whole frame quivering with 
strong agony; as she struggled to speak to him; as she strove to- 
stem back in her heart the wave of tenderness that surged up in an- 
swer to his voice; as she sought vainly for words in which to say to 
him what she had to tell; as he stood there and looked down, and 
the soft sunset glanced full upon her bending figure and quivered in 
rays of light and shade upon her dusky hair, there rose up withim 
him suddenly a storm uncontrollable of passionate love and pity for 
her, and he flung himself down by her side, caught up the folds of 
her dress and the fringe of her falling mantle, kissed them again 
and again, and in a voice, breaking with strong emotion, “ Never 
mind — never mind anything — anything; only love me I” he cried. 


THE SUK-MAID. 


177 

The slrenpjth of his emotion and the painful excitement of his 
voice and manner seemed to rouse her. She turned her face toward 
him, and a look of keen suffering passed over it for a moment as her 
eyes met his. Then she gathered herself together, and essayed once 
more to speak. She put up her hand, as if to compose and steady 
him, upon his shoulder. She looked into his face, all quivering as 
it was with intense feeling; and then, as he again, in lenderest ac- 
cents, murmured her name, she said, in a low, trembling tone, “ Sir 
Gilbert, I must speak to you, and you must listen to me while I tell 
you of my life, of my history, of everything that in all my wander- 
ing years has befallen me; above aH^ while I speak to you of —my 
husband.” 

At the last word her voice sunk almost to a whisper, but still it 
fell upon his ear spoken distinct and clear. 

“ Tell me nothing, nothing — save that you love me,” he reiterat- 
ed, in passionate accents again. 

” No, no! Hush! hush! you must listen; you must hear me. 1 
must speak of him; you do not know — you never asked me, and till 
the other day 1 could not tell you,” she said. ” But now, now. Sir 
Gilbert, you must not speak thus to me; you must go; you must 
leave me. 1 must never, never see you again, for you must never 
tell me that you love me; you must never ask me for my love — I 
have none to give you. Alas! alas! it is not mine to give.” And 
she turned from him, and her head sunk on her clasped hands again. 

Gilbert had risen to his feet almost at her first words, and his hand 
had dropped from its hold of hers. He stood by her side as the sen- 
tences broke from her, looking down upon her eager, pleading, 
agitated face; and when she ceased and turned from him agair 
strange expression came over his countenance, a cold pallor upon 
cheek, an icy hardness to his eyes, a stern, bitter look forming it 
upon his quivering lips. 

“ What am I to understand, Zophee?” he said; and his voice w. 
low and constrained now, as if he were struggling to put a strong 
force of control upon himself. “ What am 1 to understand from 
the words you say?” 

“1 can scarcely tell you,” she continued, rapidly. “1 scarcely 
know myself. Till the other day— till the duke came, I mean— 1 
knew nothing; and though 1 feared often, and kept my promises, 
and veiled my guardian’s secret and sheltered his honor and his 
name, still 1 thought him dead. 1 did— we all did.” she added. 
” Even his father awaited only assurance for my recall—” 

” Zophee! Zophee! what are you saying?” cried Gilbert, break- 
ing in suddenly upon her words. ‘‘Speak plainly to me. What 
have 1 to hear? What am 1 to understand?” 

“ Understand— that he lives,” she answered him. 

“He? Do you mean your husband? Zophee, Zophee, do not say 
it!” he exclaimed then, his voice ringing with horror and anguish 
as the truth she was trying to convey to him came breaking slowly 
in upon his mind. “ Hush! hush! do not say it, do not say it!” he 
cried. 

“ Say it! I must say it,” she said. “ I have been wanting to say 
it for days to you, only you would not come to me; you would not 
hear.” 


THE SUN-MAID. 


178 

“Ob, no, no!” be cried again, suddenly clinching bis bands 
together as he spoke, throwing bis bead back, and stamping bis foot 
upon the ground as if to annihilate and crush beneath it tlie terrible 
and agonizing idea. “ No, no! Say it is not true; it is a hideous 
dream. Am 1 mad, Zophee? I love you, 1 tell you. 1 have loved 
you, and you have been mine, only mine, for all these many days. 
Say it is not true, Zophee; say it is not true.” 

“ 1 cannot, I cannot,” she said. 

“ Do you not see that you are maddening me?” he broke out 
again. “ Do you not see that you are breaking my heart? Say 
th^ey are but jest, these cruel, words; say you are but trying me — 
they are but jest and folly. Say that you are mine, my darling. 
Say, is it not so? You are my own, only mine — no one, dead or liv- 
ing, can come between us now.” 

“ Hush, hush!” she said. “ It is true — true. He lives; he lives. 
Two months ago, as the Duke George tells me, he was seen alive.” 

“ 1 will not believe it; 1 will not. Do not tell it me; do not say 
it to me. It is not true; it is a base, cruel, horrible lie!” he cried. 

“ It is true; it is true. I am not free. I have no love to give you 
— to give any one. Dear friend, forgive me, and leave me,” she 
whispered low. 

Then for a moment he did leave her; he walked away and tinned 
from her without word of forgiveness, without answer of any kind; 
and he stood turned quite away from her, silent, confused, eveiy 
faculty seemingly stunned. 

“ Will you not forgive me?” she asked, suddenly again. “ Will 
not forgive me? or at least hear me before you condemn me 
te unheard. Hear me!” she added, passionately, “my friend 
)ert, my dear, dear friend, hear me; do not turn from me, do not 
lemn me unheard. ’ ’ 

e had walked to the window and was looking out upon the val- 

j with eyes that saw nothing, striving to clear his mind and to 

all the throbbing in his brain, and to understand what she had said 
to him. He made no answer, and Zophee buried her face in her 
quivering hands again and bent over the table, her whole frame 
shaken with the strong agony, like a quivering leaf in the storm. 
She was utterly heart-broken at that moment— utterly heart-broken, 
for herself, for him. 

Suddenly he turned to her again. 

“ 1 cannot bear it — 1 cannot bear it!” he cried. “ Say it is not 
true, Zophee; it is a mad dream that is torturing my brain ; it is not 
true. Cannot I wake again? Speak to me; tell me it is not true; 
there is no one between us. You loved me, and 1 have never loved 
but you. AVhat is it? Speak to me— it is not true; surely it is not 
true!” 

She could say no more now. She kept her face still covered with 
her hands, she shook her head only in answer to his last vehement 
words ; and he came up once more and stood close to her, and they 
were both quite silent again. The truth was forcing itself upon 
him. The truth— and the fact that it was the truth— seemed to 
stupefy him with misery, to still every power of realization or under- 
standing in his mind. He could not think clearly or see clearly ; 
but, as he stood there, memories were rushing wildly over him of 


THE SUN-MAID. 


179 


all her strange and inexplicable ways, of ber secret, her mysterious 
life, of the veil that hung low over her heart, of her silence, her sor- 
row — of her many incomprehensible words. Was this what it 
meant? This — even now he understood notning save that “ some 
one ” lived who stood between them, and that that “ some one ” 
was —her husband. It all rushed upon him with irrepressible force; 
his heart seemed breaking with speechess horror and agony, his 
brain felt utterly stunned. He could understand nothing, save the 
one dreadful fact. Some one stood between them; some one lived 
to separate them, one who he thought — who she had thought — 
was dead. It all seemed too much, too sudden. He could not real- 
ize or gather strength to bear it, and only one confused feeling took 
then possession of his mind; he must go. He must escape into the 
free air, and be alone. He must look into his own heart and under- 
stand what had befallen him; he must clear up this fearful darkness 
that seemed to cloud and quite cover his understanding and his 
brain. 

Once again, then, without another word, he nearly turned and left 
her; left her, as she sat weeping there, her face hidden away from 
him, her voice silenced by the agony of emotion which shook her 
frame. He almost left her, but as he went, just as he turned away, 
something stayed him. His strong tenderness for her came surging 
up; his eager pity, his bitter longing for her love, his passionate de- 
sire to see once more her sweet, soft smile — all overcame him, and 
before he left her he sprung back again. 

He took her hands in his, drawing them forcibly, almost roughly, 
from her face, and he bent down and made her look at him with her 
soft, brown eyes, and he gazed, straight and searchingly, into their 
depth. 

“Zophee, Zophee! You love me? At all events, you do love 
me?” he said. ” Before 1 leave you, will you not say even as much 
as to me?” , , 

The tears welled over then and coursed down her cheeks, and her 
lips parted again in a quivering smile of farewell. She tried to turn 
from him, and, with the two Hands which he held clasped so eagerly, 
to push him gently away, but she could not say another word to 
him: and, after w'aiting a moment and looking for his answer into 
her face, he bent low, rai^d her hands to his lips, and kissed them, 
tenderly and passionately again and again. Then he loosened Ins 
strong hold upon them, and while she turned away to cover her tear- 
ful face once more, he wn'ftgone. 


CHAPTER XXIil. 


VIGILS. 


It was four miles across the valley from chalet to the Bridge of 
jumneon, at the entrance to the town of Pau. Gilbert walked 
r ^Iv over the way, unconscious of the distance, unconscious of the 
t It was quite evening, and almost dark, when he entered 

bSthe Place Grammont; the lamp-lights were flickering along the 

streets and under the trees when he passed the Place Royale, and 


180 


THE SUH-MAID. 


the stars were coming out, clear and brilliant, in the archway of the 
sky. He noticed nothing; he trod rapidly along, and reached the 
Rue de Lycee, and crossed the court- yard, and went up to his own 
room, quite unconscious of how he had come there, of what he was 
doing, or of what he meant to do. 

He came in and sat down, without calling his servant or seeking 
for lights, by his little writing-table in the window, and he rested 
his head upon his hands, and looked drearily out into the darkness 
and across the Gave to the stern mountains that rose far away against 
the dim horizon of the sky. There they were, glorious and stupen- 
dous as ever, in the dreamy distance that lies so far beyond our 
human turmoils, and that amidst and above them all remains ever 
so tranquil and so sublime. He looked, but he saw — nothing. In 
the stunned and bitter trouble of his heart and brain, the tranquil 
glory of the mountains had no message for him. 

The whole thing had come so suddenly; the breaking- up of his 
complacency and composure, the discovery of his love, the sweet- 
ness of its realization, the intense brightness of his undaunted hopes; 
then the crushing disappointment, the revelation, made in such few 
swift words, carrying such a burden of misery, such a blank, un- 
conquerable darkness in their meaning, causing such a chaos of hor- 
ror in his heart and mind. What did it all mean? Her husband 
lived — and she had never told him. Her husband, whose very exist- 
ence in any dim and far-distant past had never fallen, as the faintest 
shadow, between them. He lived, and stood forever in their path! 
And she had never told him, and had let him love her, and had let 
It all go on; and it had been so sweet, and so perfect, and so 
heavenly, through all these weeks and weeks of happy, sunlit days. 
And now— now? It was all too much for him. It overcame, and 
quite crushed him down. 

In dumb agony of spirit, he sat there hour after hour as the night 
fell. He never knew how long he sat, or how the time had passed. 
His servant came, and, in obedience to a half -conscious order, had 
brought him food, and then left him again, silenced and awe-struck 
by the expression of mute suftering in his master’s face; and Gilbert 
had eaten, and then sat down again, and had bid the man oiifce more 
to leave him, adding that he would not go out that night, that he 
should require nothing, and that everj’^ one might go to bed. He 
would be leftalone, he repeated. “ He had had bad news?” ” Yes,” 
he said, dreamily, in answer to the half-spoken question the servant 
ventured to put. . ^ 

And then, again, he sat on in solituae, and saw the night fall 
deeper and deeper, and the moon glisten soft,ly over the mountains 
for hour after hour. Sometimes he rose, and paced up and down in 
restless misery, and again he would return to his place by the win- 
dow and gaze out upon the hills; but he could not g'o to rest; he 
could not clear or calm his mind ; he could not find peace, or be still. 
And he sat there, or paced to and fro, as hour succeeded hodr, and 
the night passed on. 

The morning came breaking upon him at last while he wa^-; 111 

f azing there. The gray, misty light crept over the horizon,^ ^id 
ushed into warm tints of violet and rose, and at last the mounf^^ ns 
and the valley were beautiful with the glories of the morning, ^aud 


THE SUH-MAID. 181 

liis weary, aching eyes wandered over them, still but half conscious 
of what he saw. 

The changeful splendor of the breaking day seemed, however, at 
last to move him. The expression of dull stupor passed from his 
eyes and brow, as the warm, deep light crept slowly over the far tops 
of the hills. He roused himself for a moment; he pushed his hair 
back from his forehead; he sighed heavily, as if tired out with the 
night-long reiteration of his bitter thoughts ; he threw his head back, 
and, as if that strong, glorious light flushing from the gold-bathed 
mountains were too much for him, he closed his eyes, and for a mo- 
ment again remained quite still. The morning was breaking so 
beautifully over there, the glorious Pyrenean day was rising into 
glad sunshine once more; and for him, ah! for him, all sunshine 
seemed, for this and for all coming days, to have gone, quite gone 
out from his heart. 

Suddenly, as he sat with closed eyelids thus, a sound reached him; 
it roused him once again, and, without knowing why he did it, 
made him start hastily up. It was flve o’clock. Morning was quite 
come now, and the world was waking round him, and the distant 
roll of wheels was passing over the streets ; and at that moment, as 
the hour rang from the little clock on his chimney-piece, the sharp 
clatter of a horse’s hoof echoed up from the court-yard below. It 
was that sound which at length had roused him. 

Still, scarce knowing why he went, he turned out of his sitting- 
room and crossed the passage, and went to the large window looking 
into the yard, and he pressed his hot forehead upon the cold glass 
and looked down wearily, with heavy-laden eyes, into the court be- 
low. And then he started. His grooms were not out yet; there were 
none of his servants there, nor was it any hoi*se of his that was strik- 
ing his hoofs with noisy impatience upon the pavement. But both 
horse and rider he had seen before. 

Just under the window, standing still and obedient, waiting for 
some one to .emerge, he saw through the cool, clear morning light 
Vazuza, Madame Zophee’s little, beautiful black mare, her long, 
bushy tail twitching impatiently, her neck arched under the restrain- 
ing rein, and on her back Vasilie, sitting upright, motionless as an 
orderly bearing military commands. He had his flat fur cap on, 
and a shoit kaftan trimmed round the neck and sleeves with fur. 
Gilbert recognized him immediateiy ; and obeying his first impulse, 
he turned quickly and walked down the stairs. He opened the big 
house-door into the court-yard, and came out, and Vasilie touched 
his cap and bowed gravely as he appeared. 

“lam delighted,” the Russian said, in very broken French, “ de- 
lighted to see monsieur. I was awaiting for a groom or valet to 
bear my message to him; but monsieur is right to take the beautiful 
air of the morning, and I am happy to find him well. 1 have a letter 
— a packet from Madame Zophia Petrovna Variazinka for monsieur, 
and 1 hasten to deliver it now. See, it is safe; it is here. Madame 
is also stirring; she came out, even to the stables, this morning, as 1 
was tending Vazuza, before four o’clock, and she gave me this, and 
said, ‘ Ride, Vasilie, and give it to the servant of the Monsieur En- 
glish, that he may have it when he leaves his chamber at an early 
hour.’ ‘ Sluches,’ I said, and 1 am here; 1 obey. 1 now give it to 


THE SUN-MAID. 


183 

monsieur with my own hand, which is surely the best obedience 
which madame could desire.” 

And he stooped, after this long harangue, and put a large, sealed 
letter, with much ceiemony, into Gilbert’s hand. Gilbert had been 
too bewildered, and far too much surprised to interrupt him. 

“ Does madame expect an answer? Will you wait till 1 have 
opened and read this, Vasilie,” he said at length, as he took the 
packet and turned it slowl}’- in his hand. 

” Willingly 1 will await, monsieur. Your pleasure is my com- 
mand. Or stay; it is but five o’clock. 1 will pass to the Vilette de 
Veuii with your permission, fori would see the learned Sardou there. 
1 would ask a prescription, monsieur, for the cure of the darling 
Vazuza’s cough. He is old and wise, that Sardou— he knows many 
a thing; and 1 will come again here at seven, in two hours indeea. 
Will that serve your commands, monsieur? I will await here your 
orders. Will that serve you— eh, monsieur, it I come again?” 

” Good,” said Gilbert, quietly, in a dreamy, half-conscious tone, 
looking strangely from the letter up to Vasilie, ancf then back at his 
precious packet again. “ Very good. Come again in two hours, ” 
he said; and then Vasilie rode slowly out of the yard, and Gilbert 
turned up the broad, wide steps, and went back to his room once 
more. 

It was bright daylight now, and the glow of a beautiful spring 
morning was flooding mountains and valley, and filling the room. 
But he felt chilled and weary as he came back to his window-seat, 
though the touch of the letter, as he held it in his hand, thrilled, 
with the warmth of renewed excitement, to his heart. He was worn 
out with the night’s vigil, and the vibrations of strong feeling that 
shot through his frame seemed to overpower him. He could not 
open his letter; he felt too weary and sick and faint. He rose sud- 
denly, and rang hastily for liis servant, who had happily heard him 
moving in the house, and immediately appeared. Gilbert told him 
to bring coffee; for the thought stiuck him that what he felt now 
was the need of food to give him strength to bear the new reviving 
life that was Stirling with such strange excitement within, thrilling 
him, with such a fever of re- awakening anticipation and reviving 
hope. The very sight of her letter, as he held it gently between his 
fingers, and traced the delicate writing of his name upon the cover, 
seemed to do all this for him without knowing the contents. 

She had written to him! She had been thinking of him, then, as 
he had sat there the long night through thinking only of her, and 
she had written to him, and lengthily. Surely here lay at last, then, 
explanation clear and comprehensible of that dire confusion of horrid 
mystery that tortured and stunned his brain. Yesterday he had had 
no strength to stay to hear quietly her story, so she had written it 
in pity for him ; and here, surely, it lay for his perusal now. 

He sat pausing still, however — he scarcely knew whj’-, except from 
the sheer weakness and fatigue of his throbbing brain -pausing be- 
fore he opened her letter; and the memory of her came again, flitting 
backward and forward before him, as he sat tr.^.cing her writing. 
The vision of her sweet, quiet face; of her great, dreamy eyes ; of 
her soft, dusk:y hair; of all her tender, changeful expressions — all 
came back to him, thrilling new and strangely to his heart. For, 


THE SUN-MAID. 


183 


as he thought of her uow, all the bitter, hard things he had felt to- 
ward her during that long night recuiTed to- him, and his heart smote 
him because of them again and again. 

_ She had written to him, he told himself, and he had thought so 
bit.terl}^ of her that he felt scarcely worthy now to read her letter. 
She was sorry for him; and in his misery«during that dark night 
all sorrow had nearly left his heart for her, and he had mourned his 
own sulfering only; and for that he felt now unworthy. 

Here, in her own handwriting, in the lightly traced, foreign-look- 
ing lines he had learned to love so well, was the story of her part in 
the sorrow that had fallen so strangely over him. 

Here was the unveiled history of her hidden and silent past. He 
felt unworthy to peruse it, so hardly and so bitterly, while.she sat 
and wrote to him, had he thought of her. But she had written; she 
had spent the long, weary night in preparing this for him. Now, 
surely, he must rouse himself and read. 

He sat down in his low smoking-chair, and with quick, trembling 
fingers he at last broke the seal of her letter. His eyes suffused, 
and something gathered in them, half blinding him, as he read the 
opening w^ords. 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

HER TALE. 

“ I AM sitting up all night to write to you. You will not hear me, 
and 1 have so much to' say. You will not let me tell you what I 
have been trying to tell again, and again during the last week, and 
what I have longed to tell you for many months gone by. 

“ Dear friend, when 1 think that, with all my resolutions, and all 
iny w^eak struggles, I have let you come to feel for me as you do, 
my heart is crushed with remorse and self-reproach, and bitter 
shame; and my sorrow^ for you — my repentance for the great injury 1 
have done you— overpow^ers every feeling of regret or pity for my- 
self. But my heart is also riven; I am sad and mournful for my 
own loss, for 1 must lose you, my dear friend. When 1 looked up 
and met ^our glance that afternoon on which the duke first arrived, 
1 knew — 1 felt an instinctive and saddening conviction — that 1 was 
bidding you in my own heart farew’^ell ; silently it rose within me — 
‘ f arew^ell. ' The words he had said to me — the message he had 
brought — seemed the knell of our happy friendship, and 1 felt they 
must separate us forever. For he called me back to the past — to 
Russia, dear friend; and you would return to your own land again. 

“ Would that we had then parted at that happy moment — parted 
with our friendship all living and bright for each other — without 
ever waking up to realize what parting means for us, without living 
to know that our friendship was dead. 

“ If 1 could have seen you go laughing and light-hearted as you 
came to me, and as 1 have known you, I could have borne my own 
-share of our parting grief. I would have cherished the memoiy of 
your presence, and of your laugh, and of your smile, through all my 
lonely years in the future, as the sweet gentle memory of a dear, 
bright friend; andl should have felt thankful that this happy winter 


THE SUH-MAID. 


184 

had been, for it has somehow brought youth back with a flood of 
sunlight into my deadened heart. A glow might have lingered in. 
memory and associations that would have lighted up my solitude 
through many a shadowy hour. 

“ But now, alas! it is all otherwise. Only bitter regrets are mine, 
and weary reiterations fi^l my mind as I look back upon the happy 
months that have been. 

“ Why did 1 deceive myself? AVhy did 1 allow it all?— the 
sweetness of our blossoming friendship, or its bitter and inevitable 
fruits. Dear friend, forgive me. Again and again the vvords well 
up to my lips; again and again 1 crave to say them to you, in deepest 
humiliation of my soul. And now can 1 expiate? Never! Can 1 
excuse myself? It is for you to say, Judge, and forgive me, if ;^ou 
can, Gilbert. I tell you my story without reserve; I hide nothing 
from you. All my past, all my secrets, are yours. 

“ I must begin — let me think; how — by telling you of two friends, 
Pietro Dimitrivitch Variazinka and Serge Michailovitch Vododski, 
who, forty years ago, studied side by side in the great college at Stl 
Petersburg. The same study made of these two different men. 
Serge Vododski, from his earliest years, was a thinker, a philanthrO' 
pist, a politician — alwaj's a successful man. He came from North- 
ern Kussia. His people were of the grave and hardy race who dwell 
there — ‘ Old Russians,’ as they are called — a grand, independent peo- 
ple, a race who have never felt the yoke of the Tartar, nor fallea 
under the Eastern’s sway. 

“ Pietro Variazinka was from the South — of Polish descent, from 
his name, and of Southern blood, from his temperament. In every 
element of his character he was the opposite of Vododski. Enthusi- 
astic, impassioned, excitable, visionary in theories, vehement and 
indiscreet in his expressions, as the other was sober and calm. Var- 
iazinka was a poet. They were the counterparts of human char- 
acter, and as sunshine woos the shade, and shade absorbs the sun- 
shine, so these two cast their checkered influence across each other’s 
life, and with a wonderful intensity of young devotion they loved 
one another. From their earliest days their strong, earnest patriot- 
ism formed a bond of union between them. They adored their Rus- 
sia, as young Russians do love their land, loved her in the depth of 
lier bondage, in the midst of the sufferings in which through those 
dark years she lay. 

“ These were dark days for Russia. Nicholas was on the imperial 
throne, and his dynasty was in its spirit crusliing to aspiration, to. 
new thoughts, to all expansion of the life and souls of men. 

“ Both Serge Vododski and Pietro Variazinka pined to serve their 
country. Both thrilled with ardor to tight in her battle that led to- 
ward fuller freedom and light. Both had drunk deep of the new 
wine of the poets of their early days— of Lomonosof, Puschkin^ 
Davidov, and Derzhavin. They were fired with the ardor of young 
life as it was kindling, strong and bright, in their Northern land, 
and ‘ Svobodnaya Rossia’ were, of all living speech, the words to 
them most dear. 

“ Vododski set his grave mind to work in a right direction. He 
found means of serving his country at an early age, and in a good 
way. Practically, and with a quiet activity, he served her well. 


THE SUN-MAID. 


185 


** Variazinka, on the other hand, served his paine, in the fiery 
days of his early youth, chiefly in his dreams. The poems of Derz- 
haVin were as a gospel to him. The story of Lamarinsk bewitched 
him — of that young revolutionary poet of freedom who, raising his 
voice and flashiog his glorious historic verses over St. Petersburg, 
bad lived in a transitory gleam in the early days of Nicholas, and 
had vanished, leaving nothing but a track of light behind — a light 
that glowed, however, for young Russia as the first faint promise of 
the day. Ilis story, above all others, fired the brain of Pietro Vari- 
azinka, and made him nearly mac^ Before he was twenty, and just 
when Vododski, who was three years his senior, rec'eived his ap- 
pointment to a desk in the office of the chief minister of the state, 
Variazinka published the first stanza of a poem on liberty in the ad- 
vanced journal of St. Petersburg of which the second stanza was 
long expected, and long looked for, but never saw the light of day. 
For, alas! ere the ink was dry on the last page or the fervor of his 
art and passion had cooled from the young poet’s brow, the sum- 
mons had reached him too. His muse was consigned to ignominy 
and destruction, and he was on his way to exile and obscurity for- 
ever. 

“ He went, condemned to the mines; but, before he reached them, 
a voice had been raised to arrest so far his doom. Serge Vododski 
was just then making an early and veiy prudent marriage with a 
distant cousin of Alexandra Feodorovna, whose son, George Nico- 
laievitch, is now at Pau. As a guerdon of her love. Serge sought 
from his wife, on their marriage-eve, intercession through the em- 
press for his friend; and thus, at the outset of their two lives, he re- 
deemed Pietro from degradation and slavery, and raised him from a 
convict to an exile. Thus Serge won for Variazinka the precious 
freedom to make his home as fancy led him anywhere within the 
limits of that wide Eastern realm — exiled from Russig,, indeed; but 
through Asia he might wander as he pleased. 

“ He went South — across the Kirghiz stcippe— because he was a 
poet still, and because beautiful foliage, and lovely skies, and the 
soft atmosphere of the South were to him as joys still left in life. 

“ Do you remember the drawing you once found in n^ portfolio 
of the house beneath the soft, exotic shades of the Tamarisk by the 
sapphire waves of the Caspian Sea? It was there that my father 
wandered; there he found his soft Southern bride— his ‘ Tsiganie,’ 
as he loved to call her, whether truly, or just to please a poetic fancy 
on his own part, 1 never clearly knew. There he lived, and she with 
him, and I— their one little child. There we lived, in a strange wil- 
derness of sunshine and flowers, and in the beauty and the glory of 
young, joyous life. 

“ My mother— how well 1 can recall her! She was happy, gentle, 
dark-eyed, silent, or speaking in soft, cooing tones — strange, tender, 
Southern words — of which the very echoes seem to have died away 
in my ears now, like the whispering of the far-off waves. 1 vras 
happy, happy as the song-birds, joyous as the sun rippling our azure 
inland sea. 

“ Only he, my father— poet, patriot, dreamer— was weary often, 
and very heart-sick in his exiled life. My Southern mother never 
understood him, never in the very least. Hojv could she? Love 


18G 


THE SUH-MAID. 


was the only language for exchanging thought between them that 
she knew. She was beautiful, and he loved her, and he was as the 
sun in the midday heavens to her. But understand him! Ah! only 
1, his wild, dreamy child, could do that in those days. 

“ 1 understood him, and, in all that lonely country, only I. From 
my earliest yearn, I cannot recollect the day when his thoughts, and 
dreams, and rich flow of poetic language were diflicult or myster- 
ious to me. 1 do not remember a time when, through him, 1 did 
not love the far country of his early youth — Russia, the land for 
which he had pleaded in living^ words, that have since been life to 
many, though they were death and exile to him. 

“ 1 loved the freedom of Russia, and the glory of Russia, and the 
welfare of its people, and the honor of its name, long before my 
eyes had rested on its snowy steppes, or my feet had trodden its 
rugged soul. 1 loved it because he loved it, because its glory was 
dearer to my father than home, or than freedom, or than life. 

“ No echo, however, reached us, through many years of my young 
days, of the real history of that far-off land of ours. And it was not 
till my mother was dead, till my father’s health was well-nigh bro- 
ken, till all the vigor of his wild youth had fled, till the Are of his 
poetry was quenched within him, "and the hopes of his throbbing 
heart quite extinguished as well, that the news reached us, at long 
last, after many years, to him — ah! so weary and so many — the 
message came, that his exile was over, his sentence was canceled, 
and his sorrows at an end. 

“ It was by the same voice that my father then learned particu- 
lars of the war that had been between France, Russia, and England, 
half a score of years before. Then only he heard that Nicholas 
Paulovitch had died while 1 was yet an infant in the cradle; that re- 
form — wide, generous, powerful, and beneficent — was agitating 
Russia from Archangel to Kasan ; and that leading the van of this 
reform, side by side, with the •chief councilors of a wise and bene- 
ficent sovereign, stood Serge -Michailovitch Yododski, his earliest and 
never-forgotten friend. 

“ In my first infant prayers, murmured in broken words by the 
side of m;^ Russian father, in childish supplication to the God scarce 
known to my sun-born mother, and in the form of a church of 
which she had never heard, I had learned long ago to blend the 
name of Serge Vododski with all the rest I loved, praying for him 
as the savior of my father in his first exile, as his deliverer from 
the heavy chains, the fiery scourge, and the bitter shame of a con- 
vict mine. 

“ But now I had more to learn; and I can still remember the pas- 
sionate enthusiasm and adoration for the name that thrilled through 
my heart as 1 saw the glow in my father’s pale cheek and the flash 
in his eyes, when liberty was brought to him, the recall to his be- 
loved, his own native land, and, when the news reached us that all 
this w^as due to the efforts— constant, faithful, and untiring— of 
Serge Vododski, wdio, through all his life of success and honorable 
prosperity, had never once foigotten his exiled and less happy 
friend. 

“ I adored his name; to my sinking and heart- weary father he 
sent that new glo\y of reawakening life. All unknown I adored. 


THE SUH-MAID. 


187 


him, and in passionate accents of eager enthusiasm 1 stood and 
vowed my whole heart’s devotion to him; 1 promised before God 
and the Church, to my father and to my own soul, that 1 would live 
but to serve Serge Michailovitch Vododski, and to repay him the 
heavy debt of our freedom and our lives. My father approved my 
saying, and added his blessing to my vow, assenting thereto with 
the words, ‘ May it be yours indeed, my daughter, to pay the debt of 
gratitude that lies so heavy upon me!’ Eager, enthusiastic words 
on both sides were ours that joyous day— words of which the mean- 
ing was to one and both unknown ; but we stood and spoke them, 
and the vow was vowed. 

“ After that we left Persia and our sunny home by the Caspian 
Sea, and we traveled long — long and far. Do you remember an- 
other picture 1 showed to you?— my father’s drawing of our journey 
in a deer-drawn teljeda across the steppes. Retook the sketch when 
we halted one night, as I told you, at a village near the frontier by 
the Transcaucasian way. We came on into Russia then, wild way- 
farers, savage-like pilgrims form the Sun-lands, as we were. 

“ We came to Moscow, and there Vododski met us. Once more 
the comrades of a glowing youth met, both long past the meridian 
of their changeful days; the successful and great-hearted politician 
meeting once again the poet, from whose wasted years exile had 
worn all power and fire of spirit away. And he, our friend, was 
tender and careful and pitiful for the poor, broken-down one, and 
gathered hinr, weary and life-worn, into the shelter of his love. 

“ ‘ You must not stay here, Pietro,’ Vododski said; and 1 remem- 
ber how gently the words were murmured as he glanced with his 
deep, far-seeing eyes from our windows uponMoscowr’s wintery rai- 
ment of snow. ‘ You must not linger a week here; the journey 
already has been too much for you; you were foolish to cross the 
steppes so early in the spring. Now this climate would kill you my 
friend, and that exotic blossom of yours, your little dusky-haired 
maid of the sun. You must go South again, both of you. At once 
you must go- nay, leave it to me,’ he went on. ‘ I will make ar- 
rangements for you; you shall accompany my sister, for she goes 
southward immediately; she goes next week to Pau.’ 

“ And so we came traveling here safely under the kind protection 
of Vododski’s relations; sav^ed by his foresight, every trial; our 
way smoothed by his considerate care. We came here, and when 
we were settled, he wrote to us and said his work for us was now 
nearly over, for the scheme of his devoted efforts was complete. The 
old home of my father’s family, he wrote, Zytomir, my inheritance, 
of which my father had dreamed and talked so often in the far 
South, was his once more. Restored from confiscation, given back 
to crown honorably the last fading years of my father s life, came, 
through Vododski’s message, as the emperor’s gift, sent at last to 
my father, as a tardy but well-prized recognition of that genius and 
patriotism which had been ever so true and heartfelt, though in the 
old days so premature. 

“ Then was my father happy and in great peace, because he was 
the honored master of Variadonska once again, and a poet whose 
verse lyas permitted, read, and admired; and because Russia was 
going to be free and happy, and filled through all its wide borders 


188 


THE SUH-MAID. 


with peace and with light. All his old dreams were dawning softer 
over the horizon in full realization and truth, and al] the patriotic 
writers of his younger days had not lived, or written, or suffered 
exile, or shed their hearts’ blood in vain. 

Therefore my father died happily — for he died soon after that: 
and then 1 was alone till he sent for me. Serge Vododski. He was 
my guardian, he said, and I should be as his daughter — live and 
grow up to womanhood in his house. And, as 1 told you once be- 
fore, from the Pyrenees 1 went to him, traveling back to Russia, 
which from that time became for years my home. 

“ 1 went to him, and in the lovely fertile districts of Vladimir 1 
dwelt with him, and grew up with his daughter, in their solitaiy 
country life. She was as a sweet sister to me, and Serge Vododski, 
from the first hour of my going among them, was as a new-found 
father — tender, devoted, and soon to be unspeakably dear. My 
future became his close concern, my education became a new and 
continual interest to him; and 1 was happy, intensely happy, be- 
cause every day I lived out, with gratitude and earnestly studied 
service, the deep devotion which for him 1 had vowed — the devo- 
tion 1 had vowed in my Sun -lands before my God, to my father, 
and to my own soul. 1 became even more than was his daughter to 
him in those days. 1 became his favorite and very constant com- 
panion. I was his ‘ Sun-maid,’ his ‘ Tsiganie,’ as he used to call me, 
echoing sweetly to my ears the pretty love-names of my father, 
which he had learned from him in those few Moscow days. 

“ His daughter, little Zaida Sergeovna Vododski, was a pretty 
girl, young and charming and bright-hearted; but politics, patriot- 
ism, the past or future of Russia, had no place in her volatile mind. 
Of course, he loved her devotedly; but when he came from his busy 
life in St. Petersburg to visit us in Vladimir, 1 was the companion 
he sought during his weeks of repose. For I understood him as ]. 
had understood my father; I found easy and truthful translations of 
his thoughts and schemes and projects for our beloved Russia in 
the memory of my father’s impassionate writings and words. 

“ And 1 spoke often to him as 1 grew older, and we talked to- 
gether in language that echoed my poet-father’s teachings, and de- 
clared me quickly as his spiritual child. 1 spoke the glowing en- 
thusiasm of my heart for these dreams of our national glpry, and 
filed my guardian often with surprise and delight. He fed and 
strengthened that enthusiasm with the influence of his own clear 
and forcible mind. 

“ His name rose in honor during these years; his intellect was as 
strong and noble as his heart was loyal and deep ; and he lived in an 
a^e, and made part of the council of a court where genius, free, cre- 
ative, and original, was recognized and appreciated; and where love 
for emperor and country, the Russian people a'nd the dynasty of the 
Romanoffs, could all live, fervent, brilliant, and — together. 

“ Our home was in Vladimir. Comtesse Zaida and 1 remained 
there many years, and grew up side by side. He left us there always 
when he went to St. Petersburg, but he came back to us whenever 
he could. And through those happy years we shared between us all 
the tender affection which he could spare from one whom 1 have not 


THE SUH-HATD. 


18& 


yet mentioned— the central object of his heart’s strong aevotion — 
his only son, ^ 

“lam now coming to my own story: to the part of it, at least, 
which most deeply concerns us, my dear friend — both you and me. 
Bear with me a few minutes, while I try to describe things as they 
were then, and endeavor to reconcile and understand characters and 
circumstances as they come crowding upon my memory now — as 1 
recall that son and father, so contrasted m every point of nature and 
characteristic as they were. If the father was earnest, deep-hearted, 
devoted, utterly unselfish, his life vowed to high and glorious pur- 
suits, the son was all that is most opposite to this. 1 cannot quote 
such words as, in his case, for description, could be used with 
truth. He was unworthy, ten times unwort%, of the father who 
loved him, and of the name he bore. 

“ And yet the depth of that father’s devotion! If he loved us, he 
adored his son. If he hoped in our future, he believed in his.. 
Against everything he clung to him ; in face of everything he cher- 
ished a confidence in his repentance and his return. 

“ 1 disliked Mettrai Vododski from the very beginning. I disliked 
him because, again and again, from his earliest school-days he 
pierced his father’s heart. Often 1 saw the |bitter anguish of the 
father, and wondered, girl as 1 was, at the constant and indestruct- 
ible nature of his love. Mettrai scorned his high aims, scoffed at his 
theories, defied his counsels, and disgraced him often by reckless 
and public contradiction of his views; and, as he grew older, and 
arrived at action and became a man, Mettrai still saw no beauty or 
glory in the grand sublimity of his f other’s spirit, but rushed into 
new ways, surging madly to and fro in political opinions and creeds, 
starting new ideas with each returning- moon, and rushing to follow 
every young headlong party in the fetate whose words kindled ex- 
citement, whose deeds produced uproar by way of social reform. 

“ 1 disliked him instinctively; add but for his father’s sake 1 
should never have addressed him bt look or word. Surely, there- 
fore, it was but a wild whim— 1 do think only a wild fancy, among 
many fancies that seized him with regard to me, and that was des- 
tined to rule so forcibly the whole /history of my life. God knows 
when or why the idea came to himJ 1 never knew it; never dreamed 
what was before me, never surmised that the sacrifice 1 had vowed 
in the land of my younger days was about to be demanded of me at 
last. 1 had no suspicion until hisf father came to me one day, with 
unusual concern written upon his grave face. 

“ ‘ My Sun-maid,’ he said, in t^e soft Russian translation of the 
-^ords — ‘ my Sun-maid, 1 would speak to you. Zophee, rny Tsig- 
anie, my Mettrai loves you. ill you save my son for me?’ 

“ And so it came to be. I ofl^ered my sacrifice, gave my life to 
him, as he required it, just ipAhy heart’s struggling answer to his 
words. My vow was acc< 2 ;;:^plished ; he asked my life of rne, and 1 
laid it down. Then anA there 1 answered him, and promised to be 
the wife of his son. X . , , • • 

“There were fiX^ce political turmoils arising about this time m 
Russia on every ffide. They sprung, most of them, from, secret and 
poisonous sourc< 3 s of evil in dark corners of the community, among 
infamous and ivil-hearted men. Little jets of fire were being shot 


THE SUH-MA.ID. 


190 

lip in many places. Again and again the placid air was disturbed 
by them, and the sublime composure ruffled with which Russian re- 
form§ were progressing in these early Alexandrian days. In certain 
circles, moreover, where every secret was known, and dark things 
stood in a vivid light of scrutiny and observation, the name of Met- 
trai Vododski had been more than once mentioned as having to do 
with matters such as these. Several of the fiery jets had been traced 
to sources very close to him, and dark suspicions were gathering 
silently round this unworthy bearer of his father’s name. 

“ That noble name, so beloved and adored through the breadth of 
Russia, how bitter it was to feel that it was threatened with shame ! 
‘You can save him,’ Serge Vododski said to me, with glittering 
eyes, as Mettrai’s name trembled on his lips; ‘ you can save him, ’ re- 
peated he. And could 1 refuse to save? Not if my heart’s blood 
were to flow in all reality at his feet in the sacrifice a living and 
crimson stream. 1 could not refuse. I was ready! 

“ 1 was but a child, remember, then — a woman in the strength of 
my enthusiasm, and in the intensity of my purpose of sacrificial love 
— but a child in all knowledge of my own heart, or of human life, 
or of the world, save of my flowery South-lands, and of our quiet 
retreat in the plains of Vladimir. 

“ At K— we were married. The day was one marked in Russian 
history — known, cursed, and execrated by every loyal Russian 
tongue. It was a dark and a famous day. We were married with 
all the pomp and ceremony of our Church, but still very quietly. 
jVlettrai was so restless and uncertain, that haste was what our 
father wished for in our union, not any proud gathering of friends. 

“ So thus his friends all remained unknoivn to me; and as I had 
scarcely ever left Vladimir, there were none to come on my account. 
We were married almost privately; only the Grand Duke George, 
my guardian’s old friend (whose children had been the playmates at 
Vladimir of Zaida Vododski atnd myself), being present, with the 
Duchess Olga, his wife. 

“ I am telling you the story of that day so quietly that I can 
hardly realize now, after all t'us time, that 1 am writing myself. 
But so it was. We returned, after the lengthy ceremony was over, 
to my guardian’s house, for we were to proceed in contradiction to 
the usual rule of conventionality in a Russian marriage, and were to 
remain at my guardian’s until the morrow; then we were to leave 
together. The Government permussion for a long absence of several 
years had been obtained for Mett»rai by his father, and I was to take 
him, as that dear, devoted father hoped, away for his salvation — 
away from evil friends and wild temptations, and dark deeds and 
wicked schemes — to wander in Southern lands with me, to travel, 
and to change his nature, and to forget. 

“ I confess that 1 never seemed td ^feel any power for all this, for 
1 did not love him; but still our fathei^Trished it, and 1 agreed. 

“ When we came home to the Vododski Palace at K— , after our 
marriage, my husband of one hour left me, piyimising shortly to re- 
turn. He had been strange and excitable in yiisjnner all day, and 
his father looked anxiously at him many times as'te talked loudly, 
and without prudence or restraint. The emperor wu s at K— , pass- 
ing through on his way to Yalta, in the far South; ai.d there were 


THE SUK-MAID. 


191 

otliers in K — also, at that time — men who had appeared suddenly 
there, and whose presence was marked, watched and followed by 
many lynx-like eyes. 

“It was my marriage-day. 1 felt 1 should have been hopeful and 
light-hearted, even though 1 spent the long evening alone, but I was 
miserable. 1 could not hope ; 1 felt strangely oppressed. The very 
air all day, and especially as evening fell, seemed laden with storm, 
and the sky was lowering in the far west, as if threatening strange 
darkness to come; so, at legist, it seemed to me. As night fell, and 
the silver bells of St. Philip rang over the whole town, that storm 
burst in wild excitement, tierce rage, and strong cries of resentful 
vengeance from every corner of the town. And the news spread like 
wildfire; the emperor had been shot at, walking in the garden of 
the Place, and had narrowly escaped with his life — the good emperor, 
Alexander ‘ the Beneficent,’ whose power, in his short reign, had 
already swept over every corner of his vast land ; the beloved czar, 
whose voice had been the law of liberty to his people, whose actions 
had been stamped with benignity and grace; he whose accession in 
Russia had been as the birth of joy, for he had risen even as the 
Promised King of old, to open the prison doors, to loosen the bonds 
of the oppressed, to lighten the burdens of the serf and the slave, to 
give to Russia the key-note of freedom and the torch of knowledge 
and of spiritual light — he had been fired at by a secret, dastardly 
hand, and Russia had escaped but narrowly from a dreary mourning 
of sudden orphanage and despair. 

“ It ran like a wild cry through the city that night — the frenzy of 

the people’s horror and alarm. And K sorrowed, and hid her 

face in humiliation, because to her belonged disgrace and degrada- 
tion forever. Within her ancient walls an evil hand had been 
stretched forth to take the twice-sacred life of their pope and czar. 

“ The cri'minal had been taken, report said; and his accomplices 
— for there were many engaged in this dark plot — had been captured 
as well. Names were unknown, however. Action is quiet and 
secret in that country in times such as these, so names were quite 
concealed in all the general report, and I heard nothing that could 
account for my frenzy of undefined apprehension until quite late in 
the night, when my guardian came to me, and 1 knew all. 

“ Pale, agitated, almost speechless at first, I scarcely knew him, 
Serge Michailodtch Vododski: he was, indeed, little like himself. 
His proud crest humbled, his shoulders bent, his eye cast down* his 
glance uncertain, his voice quivering, all bereft of strength. He 
came and told me the truth. JNIy husband would no more return to 
me; he had been captured within six yards of the would-be assassin 
of his emperor, and he lay imprisoned in the deep dungeons of Fort 
Nicholas already. 

“ My guardian was broken in heart and spirit, like a grand old 
tree crushed and shivered by a fearful storm. What could I do but 
love him and comfort him? What could I do but fling my arms 
around him, and pour my tears upon his gray, bending head? What 
could I do? lyruch, as he was soon to tell me. He had come to me 

direct from Zodroki, the chief of the police department of K , 

who had come at once and secretly to him when the arrests were ac- 
complished ; and this was what my guardian had rushed to me to 


f 


192 


THE SUK-3IAID. 


sayt the arrest of my husband was still a secret, {^nd, for the sake of 
the honored name of Serge Vododski, it would be kept a secret still. 
Would 1 help to keep it? He, the broken-hearted father of the 
criminal, was high in power, and could do much for him, and much 
also to shelter forever the honor of his house and name. Only would 
I keep his secret? s 

“ He said it would be easy, for it required only silence and ac- 
quiescence from me. Easy! So it seemed to him for his son’s sake, 
and so it seemed to me for his. It meant only perfect obedience and 
complete sacrifice trom me. He explained further, and his plan 
grew clear, although spoken in hasty and broken accents, coming . 
hardly from his trembling lips. 

“ 1 was little known, he said; beyond Vladimir not known at all. 
His son’s marriage was a matter of public announcement, however; 
his son’s projected departure for years of travel had been widely 
spoken of among their friends. Would I go and travel then — where 
I would — only away, out of sight, and quite away ; and would 1 keep 
the secret in my wanderings? Would I let the great w^orld that 
knew the name of Vododski, and honored it as a name without 
shadow or slain — let all that world of Mettrai’s father think still that - 
Mettrai was absent, merely journeying to and fro; that he was trav- 
eling, happy, honorable, and innocent, and in company with me, 
his wife? Would 1 go and hide myself, retaining my own father’s 
name — one common enough in Poland, and unlikely to attract re- 
mark? Would I be silent and patient and submissive, under soli- 
tude and exile, and in the shadow of mystery, for years to come, 
•while he strove to obtain pardon and ransom for my husband — his 
guilty son? The striving, to him, must be secret, and therefore 
long. The convict’s name would be secret; in the mines he would 
be a number, and nothing besides. Serge Vododski was powerful, 
all might be achieved, all redeemed successfully; only the keeping 
of yie secret lay first with me. 

“ You know that 1 have kept it. You, my dear friend, whom 1 
have so deeply injured by my reticence, know how loyally 1 have 
obeyed my guardian, and refrained from all possible reference to the 
history of my life. ^ 1 came here, where my father had been, and the 
noble old Vododski did all he could for me to make my exile a home. 

“ Ten years went on; and though 1 was solitary and weary, be- 
cause this silence hangs like chains upon my spirit, and though my 
heart was often sore for him who was indeed my husband, and for 
him, my beloved guardian, whose brave spirit had been so smitten 
to the dust, 1 had consolations, for 1 felt my father’s gi-atitude was 
speaking in silence, and my life and exile were paying now the rich 
price of his. 

“ 1 had many thoughts, too, in my solitude, of the noble work 
which Serge Vododski had done for Itussia— work which had been 
my father’s work as well— and I felt often that 1, in my veiled ob- 
scurity, was helping to intensify the power of Vododski ’s example 
and his influence by upholding the honor of his name. I felt my 
own little life gloriously lost, and absorbed into the great future of 
reform and national progress and universal good ; and as 1 stood 
often here, in view of these mountains that suiTouud m}' exile home, 

I have thought, as Lomonosof has written : 


THE SUN-MAID. 


193 


“ ‘ Just as a sand whelmed in th’ infinite sea; 

A ray the frozen iceberg sends to heaven, 

A feather in the fierce flame’s majesty, 

A mote by midnight’s maddened whirlwind driven, 

Am I, ’midst this parade. An atom— less than naught— 

Lost and overpowered by life’s gigantic thought.’ 

‘ Thus it has seemed to me that I stood in my isolation and ob- 
scurity before the grandeur of the future and the coming time, losing 
myself and my one little life of insignificance willingly— casting it, 
as a silent sacrifice, away. Thus hope, and youth, and happiness, 
and joy, and love, all that was myself once, floated from me to be 
absorbed, as my guardian’s life had been absorbed, into the vast im- 
mensity of national honor and universal human good. 

“ All this was before you came, d^ar friend. Sometime before 
the news had reached me that Mettrai Vododski had escaped from 
the Siberian mines, just as his father’s efforts for him were ap- 
proaching success, just as hope was dawning again in the father’s 
heart that he might yet see his son restored to him, his name still 
sheltered and unstained. The news had reached the head of the 
Siberian police agency in St. Petersburg, that he had eluded their 
vigilance, and had disappeared from the mine. He got away, as 
was believed, to eastward, to the district of the rebel races — wild, 
restless tribes, who haunted the outer fringe of the convict settle- 
ment there. And he was followed, traced, and— it was long imag- 
ined — hunted down. 

“ He was reported dead, indeed, by the police authorities, for they 
thought he had been recognized in the midst of a party of rebels, 
and shot in a skirmish which took place. And we believed it — his 
father and Zaida and 1. Only we lacked proofs, and I still remained 
here, while my guardian made such inquiries and investigations as 
were called for to insure the propriety of my return. 

‘ ‘ 1 was awaiting the result of these inquiries when you first knew 
me. I was uncertain then what steps my guardian would prescribe 
to me for the safety of his precious secret in the future. If life long 
silence as to my past was to be maintained here, and maintained for- 
ever, or carried back to Russia for seclusion there, 1 still knew noth- 
ing, and 1 awaited his fiat, anxious and ignorant of its result. 

“ You came, and anxiety died within me; for 1 ceased somehow 
to care whether 1 went or stayed. Over the past, during these 
months, a veil seems to have fallen for me, softening all recollec- 
tions, and depriving them of pain. Life seemed to have reached me 
at last here — reached even me — and it was such a rosy life, new and 
sweet and strange, it stole all my memories away. 

“ So it was, dear friend, that I allowed it, for myself and for you, 
that swift, fleeting morning dream. So it was that 1 drifted into 
this wilderness in which 1 awake. Surely I did but dream during 
these months; surely I was dreaming still on that dark day when the 
Duke George came to me — the day when 1 first saw that soft love- 
light in your kp^d, bright eyes, and read the doom of our mutual 
.suffering Iheri also. For on that day the duke, who was long gov- 
ernor of the Caucasian province, told me that my husband lived. 

“ In arOther skirmish with these rebel tribes, one had been capt- 
ured— obe who was recognized as Mettrai Vododski, the escaped 
crimin'*, of the Siberian mines. 

7 


194 


ME SUN* MAID. 


“ News travels slowly from these Eastern regions. Mettrai had 
been captured, and his life saved by intercession through the Duke 
George’s influence; but, before the tidings reached mie of his dis- 
covery, he had escaped again; and he is there now. As far as we 
know aught of him, he is among these people, and alive. 

“ So 1 reached the point where we parted to-day, and I feel that 1 
can write no more. And yet there is much still 1 long to say to you, 
though 1 have told my whole story now, and have nothing more to- 
tell. But I long to thank you— to thank you for your brightness 
and your youth, and for your winning kindliness to me, and for ail 
the happy days you have given me that 1 have to remember in all 
time to come. But when I would write these words, my pen is 
arrested. Thankfulness and gladness for your sunshine and your 
youth are changed, as I thinkof yesterday, into sorrow, into sadness, 
into remorse and despair, and 1 can say no more save — forgive me, 
if, now you know all, you feel you can. And, dear friend, if you 
will not break my heart utterly, be happy. Let me think of you 
still bright and youthful, as 1 have seen you so many days in these 
months ^one by. Let me think it is so, and that life stretches fair 
and beautiful before you still, even though this letter be to bid you 
— farewell.” 


CHAPTER XXV. 

ONE WORD — FAREWELL. 

As Gilbert finished this letter, the sound of Vazuza’s hoofs strik- 
ing on the pavement of the court below came up once again to his 
ear, and he rose, folding the pages slowly in his hand. He drained 
once again the cupful of coffee that his servant had placed afresh, 
hot and ready, for him on the table, and tried in vain to swallow a 
morsel of bread, and then he took up his hat, went out of his room, 
down-stairs, and out to the court-yard, with a curious expression, 
softened yet determined, gathering all the while upon his face. As 
he opened the great hall-door at the foot of the staircase, the fresh 
moruing air came blowing in upon him, lifting the brown hair that 
fell heavily over his forehead, and cooling the fever of his worn face. 

There Vazuza stood, returned from her morning canter on the 
Route de Morlaas, and there w’as Vasilie, grim and motionless as a 
rock, sitting patiently, awaiting his commands. Gilbert hesitated a 
moment as he came out, and glanced hurnedy around. Itw'as seven 
o’clock now, and his grooms had opened the stable-door into the 
court-yard, and were busy w,ith his horses, emitting into the morn- 
ing air many curious and characteristic sounds. Gilbert paused, 
and then a look of impatience swept over his face. He could not 
even wait until his horse was saddled; he turned to Vasilie, and laid 
his hand upon Vazuza’srein. 

“Did you tell me,” he said slowly, in French “that Madame 
Variazinka was ready— that she came to you in the garden at five 
o’clock?” 

“Yes,” said Vasilie, in his solemn manner, “ madame vas ready; 
she gave me the letter herself. 1 left her among her rose.^ w'hen I 
rode away. Monsieur has written the answer?” he w^ent ol inquir- 


1 


THE SUX-MAID. 195 

ingly, glancing with surprise at IVIadame Zophee’s letter, which Gil- 
bert still held open in his hand. 

“I will take the answer,” replied Gilbert. “ Yasilie, will you 
lend me your horse? See, take one of mine — which you like— 
Charles will saddle for you; but let me have Yazuza, for I must ride 
to the chalet at once.” 

Before Gilbert had finished his sentence, Yasilie had sprung to the 
ground. He pulled his hat oft, and then stood with head bent and 
uncovered, holding Yazuza ’s rein with one hand and the stirrup with 
•the other, and Gilbert sprung on to her back. 

“ Take which horse of mine you will, Yasilie,” he repeated; “ I 
will ride Yazuza home.” And then he drew the reins through his 
fingers, and the pretty, black mare arched her proud, glossy neck, 
pawed the stones impatiently for a moment, and then Gilbert turned 
her head slowly toward the big gateway and rode out of the yard. 

It was a lovely morning ; the mountains were glistening softly, 
tender lights creeping over their summits, and chasing the shadows 
down their snowy slopes. The coteaux lay smiling in the dewy 
sparkle of the morning sunshine, and all glad and beautiful with 
the coming spring. The air was clear and light and delicious, and 
it kissed his pale cheek, and floated softly across his brow as he can- 
tered over the bridge to Jurangon, along the road to Gelos, and made 
his way up the familiar green slopes of the coteaux toward the chalet 
and St. Hilaire. The whole scenery was sweet and familiar, and it 
was beautiful as a dream in this morning light. 

He rode along, however, as he had done the night before, uncon- 
scious of anything external to his own thoughts and feelings, only 
lifting his eyes as he went, to note the way, and urging Yazuza up 
the slopes and over the shoulder of the low coteaux with feverish 
Impatience and haste. The rapid pace seemed to relieve the fierce 
throbbing of his heart as he went along, and to soothe the strange 
condition of his mind. He would have found it impossible just then 
to say how tliat letter had affected him ; he only knew that he felt in 
haste to get over the ground; he felt that he wished to reach her 
quickly and without any delay, and that he was wild with impa- 
tience, and half delirious with the fever of keen excitement that 
filled his heart and brain. 

He had made no plans of what he would say to her when he did 
reach her, however. That he wished to see her again was all that 
he realized — that he wished to stand once more, as he had stood last 
night, by her side in the garden, where Yasilie had said that he had 
left her in the early morning two hours ago. So he urged Yazuza 
on, and by the back entrance he reached the stable-yard of the chalet. 
There Ivan, coming at the sound of his approach, found him, and 
relieved him of Yazuza, with some murmured remark of astonish- 
ment in Russian, as he turned away. 

Then Gilbert walked across the stable-yard with a quiet, steady 
step, and pushed through the little gate that led into Madame 
Zophee’s flower-garden, and wound along round the house toward 
the lawn on the front side, walking, now he had reached the chalet, 
in a quiet and composed manner, as if his coming to her at this 
strange morning hour were the most natural thing he could — in fact, 
quite what she "would expect of him. 


196 


THE SUH-MAID. 


For so it seemed to him — surely she would expect him, he thought, 
at once, when he had read that story in her letter. She would ex- 
pect him, and he had come. 

He had left her the night before, in the mad impulse of anger, bit- 
terness, and dismay, and so he had come back, because all was 
altered; and love, tenderness, pity for her, eager concern, drove him 
instantly to seek her again. 

He came out upon the lawn, and tiod softly across the green turf, 
that felt smooth as vel vet beneath his tread, and was covered with 
dew-drops, sparkling like diamonds in the sun ; and he paused near 
the drawing-room window, and looked round, and drank in. quite 
unconsciously /or a moment, the morning glory of the Pic de Bigorre 
rising above the rolling mist, the soft beauty of the green valley, 
and of the clustering woods upon the coteaux slopes; let his eyes 
wander over meadow and hill; caught for an instant the mystic 
effects of the curling blue smoke that rose softly into the morning 
sky from some cottage or chateau above every woody point in the 
view. And then his gaze came wandering back again into the rich, 
bright foreground of Madame Zophee’s garden, with its burst of 
spring verdure and clusters of brilliant flowers. It lay beneath the 
flush of the morning, gemmed with those dewy diamonds, dropped 
upon every flowery petal and on every grassy blade. 

It was all so sweet and sparkling, full of light and color, and soft- 
ness and verdure and shade. His heart thrilled beneath the majesty 
of the mountain view towering above him, and the sweet familiar 
loveliness in her garden all around — that bright and picturesque 
beauty which seemed always to surround and infold her, and ever, 
to memory and association, seemed as a part of her. The garden 
was empty, however, and he sat down a moment on the wicker seat 
that stood on the grass outside her window — perhaps forgotten since 
the night before — and he waited there. He looked dreamily round 
as he waited, and glanced ba(;kward into her sitting-room, which 
was empty also. The morning sunshine only filled it, and touched 
the carving of the picture-frames, and the curious ornaments of sil- 
ver and gold that lay about the room, with bits of bright reflection 
and light. 

He could see her writing-table, where she had sat and written to 
him through the night before. It was all disordered, and her hand- 
kerchief lay there on the carpet beside her chair. Her hat, too, was 
still on the little table on which she had thrown it when she had 
taken it off as they talked together, as she came in yesterday evening 
from the picnic, and from her ride. The room seemed full of her 
presence; and so were the garden, and the sweet, beautiful view over 
the valleys and coteaux, and the glad sunshine of the spring morn- 
ing, and the glory of the majestic hills. 

He waited on for her, much as he had waited the day before, and 
yet differently. He was not bright and unconscious, full of joyous 
excitement, of secure anticipations, of hopefulness, of all the sweet 
mystic experiences of a happy love. He was not all this as he had 
been then, but still less was he heart-crushed and spirit-broken as 
when he left the night before. He was quite changed again. He 
was still intensely excited, but the strong feelings burning in his 
heart now were different, though still very confused. A determina- 


THE SUK-MAID. 197 

tion seemed to nerve him of something, he scarcely knew what' a 
sort of vague and unexpressed resolve, to which he had given no 
form or name to himself, seemed rising within him. A resolve to 
which he felt sure, however, nothing but death would brinff failure 
or change. 

Then, too, a strong and passionate pity filled his heart, and love, 
tender and chivalrous, eager, deep, and unalterable, quivered and 
thrilled there again and again; and it grew in strength and depth 
and determination as he waited in her garden in that morning light. 

He sat waiting; and as thoughts come swift and curious at sucli 
moments, the memory of his old life seemed to sweep across him— 
his life, practical, active, unpoetic as it had been before he had ever 
known his friend — and after these thoughts came, following quick- 
the realization of the gradual change that had taken place. 
Beauty had found life and speech for him during those months he 
had spent on the Pyrenees; music had found an echo within him; 
poetry had disclosed a meaning, revealed a mystic life, taught him 
a strange, new, ineffable joy; and all, as he now knew, had meant 
— love. 

Love by the way had met him; love had unsealed the depths of 
his nature, quickened his dull perceptions, colored the monotony of 
his thoughts, and lighted up the horizon of all his life to come. 

He had just reached this realization in this vague dreaming back 
upon himself, when she came at last to him — stepping out suddenly 
upon the lawn from her open window, in her white morning- dress, 
her soft shawl of Pyrenean wool wrapped, as usual, close round her 
shoulders, her skirts sweeping the grass, her face pale with the tears 
and vigils of^ the night, and her eyes soft, dark, and glowing with 
deep expression as she looked out upon the morning view. 

She passed Gilbert quite close, without observing him as she came 
out, for his seat was pushed back from the window, under the clus- 
tering^ creepers of the wall, and she stood still for a few moments, 
fancying herself in solitude, her face raised a little upward, her 
hands clasped, her whole attitude and aspect speaking the compos- 
ure of courageous suffering, resignation, and calm resolve. She 
seemed to stand there, with her upturned glance, thus facing her 
future as it lay before her, dauntless, resolved, patiently awaiting 
her fate with all its bitter decrees. 

She stood so still, and he w'atched her for one minute, and then 
he rose suddenly from his chair. He came forward; she scarcely 
heard his step upon the turf; she had no time to turn round, or to 
exclaim his name, before he was by her side, had enfolded her close 
and eagerly in his arms, and had kissed her tenderly again and 
again. 

“ My own! my darling!” he murmured, in low, trembling tones; 
“my own, and only mine! You never loved him, Zophee! you 
never belonged to him! You belong only, only to me!” 

They were standing alone there in the morning light, among the 
spring flowers and roses: and the breadth of the mountain air, and 
the song of the birds, and the sweet, fresh scent of the opening 
spring, seemed all to echo in harmony with the burst of young love 
that in quick, passionate words came pouring then before she could 
arrest them from Gilbert’s lips. He held her close for that moment, 


THE SUN-MAID. 


198 

and slie stood quite silent and still. She heard him, and for that lit- 
tle while she bent thus silently, yielding before the sweet, strong 
torrent of his love— yielding to the answering impulse of her own 
heart, drinking in the music of his voice, resting, for just a moment, 
in the strong, safe shelter of his arms. 

But then she drew back from him; she put up her hand on his 
shoulder, and looked into his face, and her eyes suffused with hot 
tears, and her lips quivered with her violent effort for composure 
and self-control. She saw the changed aspect of his countenance 
and his expression, and it pierced her heart anew with sorrow for 
herself — for him. 

“Gilbert! Gilbert! dear friend,” she murmured, “do not make 
me hate myself yet more and more.” 

He did not seem to understand her ; he stood looking down upon 
her, she still resting one hand, as if to steady and recall him to 
himself, upon his shoulder, and still looking calmly and beseeching- 
ly into his face. He caught her other hand in his. 

‘ ‘ I have come, ’ ’ he w'ent on, ‘ ‘ at once — as soon as I had read 
your letter. It was so good of you to write — 1 am so glad. 1 was 
mad last night, I think, when 1 left you; but now I am almost 
happy. You never loved him; your love, my own, is all, all for 
me.” 

“ Dear friend,” she repeated, “ have you forgiven me?” 

“ Forgive!” exclaimed he, breaking in upon her sentence. “ What 
is there to forgive? You love me, Zophee, you love me. Only say 
it; only say it,” he repeated again and a^ain. 

“ Hush! hush!” she murmured, drawing further back from him, 
but retaining his hand lightly between both of hers. “ Dear friend, 
say you forgive me; say that you understand my history, that you 
approve my silence, that you forgive all the trouble that 1 have 
brought on you. Will you keep my secret, for it is only known to 
you? will you carry it away with you? and will you say once more 
to me now, and kindly, just once, farewell?” 

“ Farewell!” he exclaimed; “1 shall never say farewell to you. 
You will not drive me from you, Zophee; you love me, you will not 
drive me away. You do love me; you will let me stay with you; 
for you must be mine, my very own. You must forget all the hor- 
rid past; you must never never again, for one moment even, remem- 
ber that you might have belonged to him.” 

“Sir Gilbert, do not break my heart,” she said, softly, again. 
“ Do not crush me with shame and despair. 1 have nothing to say 
to you but farewell, dear friend; nothing but ‘ God bless you,’ and 
‘ God speed you,’ as you go; and as your life flows on, albeit far 
away from me, may God indeed bless it, and may all brightness, all 
happiness of this earth, be yours! But farewell, dear friend, fare- 
•w^ell!” 

“Zophee, do not madden me!” he cried. “I will never leave 
you!” 

“ Hush! hush!” she murmured softly, as she bent her head be- 
fore him again. “Hush!” she repeated, “you must leave me. 
Forgive me, and say farewell.” 

“ Zophee! Zophee!” He stretched out his arms to enfold her 
once more, a gust of strong feeling sweeping' over his face; his voice 


THE SUN-MAID. 


199 


brolte and trembled ; bis accents were eager, vehement, and all un- 
controlled. “Do not drive me mad!” he cried again. “Listen, 
Zophee. I know your secret, but none others knovv^ it save you and 
I; let it be a secret still, then, my own, my love. Stay here, and -I 
will stay near to you ; or come with me away, away where you will, 
and where none shall ever hear our secret, or know that any other 
save myself, my darling, ever dared to call you his.” 

“ Sir Gilbert! Sir Gilbert! Spare me! spare me!” she cried then 
to him, turning away, and wresting one hand from his hold to clasp 
it over her eyes. “ Spare me! Do not plunge me deeper and deeper 
into humiliation and remorse! Say farewell, dear friend, and go.” 

“ Never! never!” he exclaimed, with passionate energy again. 

“ Ah! then,” she sighed, with an echo of intense anguish in her 
voice, “ then God forgive me, if you can never do so. God forgive, 
and help me to live in strength, and fidelity, and honor, and truth. 
May He help me, if you will not; may God forgive me, if you never 
can.” 

“ Zophee! Zophee! what do you mean?” he cried. 

“ 1 liave been true,” she went on, “ and 1 will be true till 1 die. 
1 promised — I will keep my promise. 1 will wait for him, 1 will 
follow him if they will let me go to him, for he is my husband be- 
fore God and man ; and my promise to his father, to my guardian, 
to my father’s deliverer and friend, was to give my life for him, and 
1 will give it. ” 

“ But, Zophee, is my life, my shattered, blighted life, no concern 
to you?” 

“ Forgive me,” she whispered. “ Forgive me. Sir Gilbert, is all 
that 1 can say. ” 

“ I shall never be happy more,” he continued, hastily; “ I can- 
not live without j^ou. 1 cannot imagine a life now from which your 
presence is gone. 1 shall never be happy. Must we do it, Zophee? 
Must we kill the joy out of both our lives?” 

“ The joy of our lives, dear friend, the happiness of the passing 
day, need that be all? Higher than happy hearts are noble lives; 
greater than joy in our own selves, surely, is joy that we buy with 
our heart’s blood for others. See; can you not go— can you not leave 
me, taking with you, and remembering ever those words of 
Lomonosof which I once wrote out foi you : ‘ Self lost in sacrifice — 
love laid on the altar of devoted promise ’ -that is my life as it lies 
before me. And yours? Let me not blight it. Dear, bright young 
companion of those months gone by, do not smite and crush me 
with that last dark thought, which is more than 1 can bear. I can- 
not give you my life, for it has been given away already. 1 cannot 
give you my love— I must wrest it from you again. Another — he, 
my guardian’s son, my husband — he may come; it must be his. He 
may claim it, and in truth and fidelity 1 must keep it for him forever. 
But take what 1 can dare to give you. Take all my heart’s deep, 
earnest concern, my anxious thought and my tearful prayers, my 
constant memory— all, all are yours. Will you not take them and 


1 do not know where to go,” he exclaimed, bitterly. “ If you 
drive me from you, there seems Bothing left for me in life to care, 
for— nowhere 1 care to go— nothing 1 care any more to do.” 


THE SU2>’-3IAID. 


200 

“ Nay, do not say so,” she urged him, looking up at him with her 
sad, pleading eyes, and holding his hand still between her own with 
a soft, light clasp. “ Nay, do not— do not say so. Rather let me 
think that for you too there may be a noble life — the^ life manly, 
earnest, and devoted awaiting you, and all such as you, in your own 
far-distant land,” 

“ I think I never shall go back to my own land,” he began again. 
“ I hate to think of it, or anything I used to care for in old days at 
home,” 

“ Ah! spare me! spare me!” murmured Zophee again “ Gilbert, 
dear friend, do not force me to feel that 1 have destroyed your life. 
Ah ! rather 'would I that you forget me — that you remembered me 
no more.” 

“ flow can 1 forget you?” he exclaimed. “ 1 shall never forget 
you. I know quite well how it will be with me in the old home 
there. 1 shall never lose the constant thought of you, not for a day, 
not for a moment.” 

“ Nay,” she said again, “ cannot you lose the thought of me, dear 
friend, in thoughts good and devoted? Forget this dream of a sum- 
mer morning in the work of the growing days. Ah! will you not 
let me think of you with all the sweet tenderness of our strong 
friendship; think of you as ennobled, not injured, in your bright 
young heart and spirit, by your acquaintance with me, by those 
hours, of which the memory will be so dear to me, which we have 
passed together, and in which we have communed with deep sym- 
pathy and enjoyment, while our friendship glided insidiously into 
love. It was my fault— my sin; forgive me, dear friend, once more 
again, and yet again 1 say it, forgive me! Say farewell, and — go.” 

She turned from him when she ceased speaking now, and a look 
of weariness passed over her face as she raised her hand with a de- 
spairing gesture to motion him once more aw'ay from her, and she 
stood silent, with her face averted and her head bending, as if the 
excitement and agitation of her last words had quite worn out her 
strength at last, as if she had no power left to say more to him at all. 

And Gilbert watched her thus for a little while, in silence also, 
with a deep sadness falling gradually over his face. It seemed to 
express itself even in his attitude, and in the movement of his hand, 
as he raised it to take his hat off, and to sweep back his hair from 
his flushed forehead. 

He watched her in silence for a few minutes, that seemed long to 
both of them, in their bitterness of spirit and despair; and then, 
somehow, instinct, that was always with him so true and courteous, 
came to him as his guide, and he approached her, and took her hand 
once more, and this time with a quiet and gentle touch. 

” Farewell! farewell, then!” he said, but he could go no further; 
his voice quivered, and the words refused to come. His hand closed 
again, with lingering tenderness, upon hers. “ You drive me away 
then, my love,” he continued; “ and at your words, for 1 would not 
weary 3mu, 1 will go. But 1 take j'our words, as you say, along 
with me, my dear one: for they are, as they have ever been for me, 
inspiring and noble -words. And I will go, in obedience — go because 
you send me, but not, believe me, to forget.” 

” Ah, yes,” she murmured: ” forget, forget!” 


THE SUN- MAID. 


201 


But he interrupted her again. 

“Nay,” he said, “1 will go, for 1 cannot speak of friendship 
now for you, and my heart is breaking, and my brain is confused, 
and I scarcely know what 1 say. So I will leave you, indeed.” 

“Farewell,” she murmured; “God bless you, my dear, noble 
friend. God bless you — farewell!” 

“ Farewell,” he echoed, in low, trembling tone; and she thought 
then that he had left her, for his face was hidden, and he had 
dropped her hand for an Instant, as if to turn and go. But he 
caught it once more, and in broken acccents began again. 

“ My sweet Zophee, my Solava, as they taught me to call you— 
you who have been as music and beauty, as soul and spirit, to my 
hard life — good-by; 1 say it till we meet again. For do not think,, 
my own one, that this is to be indeed the end. Farewell till we meet 
again, I say — till the confused thought that is in my mind, and the 
wiih that is in my heart, is one day worked out and realized, and 
until I can come back and say, in truth to you, my love.” 

“ Go,” she murmured then again to him, “ go, go;” for her heart 
seemed breaking under his eager, wistful words. It was so hard to 
part with him, so difficult in "her solitude and loneliness, to drive 
him away, and each moment it grew harder, and her strength was 
failing her; she felt it slipping fast away. “ Go, go,” she repeated. 

But once again he continued. He had something more he wished 
still to say to her, and he took her nand gently in his own again. 
His voice was low and painful now, but all bitterness was quite 
gone from it; nothing echoed, in its murmuring tones, but the sad- 
ness of his farewell. 

“ Ah!” he said, “ the dream is over— the bright, soft beauty of 
my first morning dream — and 1 will go to-day, even as you say to 
me, to clear, cold daylight, such as we know it in our Northern 
lands. And in that light I must think and realize, and find out what 
has come to me; what I am to sufter, and what 1 can do. But I 
will come to you again, my Solava, here in your mountains, on the 
sweet slopes of your coteaux of the Pyrenees; and when 1 come 
tnen, you will know, my Sun-maid, my sweet, soft flower of the 
South, that in our North-lands also we can love and be true.^ I 
will never forget you, or cease to love you, for one moment,” he 
repeated, “ until 1 come to you again.” 

“Farewell, farewell,” she whispered, her eyes raining tears, as 
she tried to look up at him once more. • A sweet, sad smile was 
auivering on her lips at the strong boyish vehemence of his last 
words; for they were like himself somehow, and lingina: with an 
echo of his old force of determination and resolve. They touched 
her, and his voice thrilled her anew, and his hand clasping hers 
seemed such comfort, such security, such strength. 

For he loved her, and that strong, young energy of his love -was 
sweet to her, and the brightness of his character was like the light of 
heaven shed across her soul. And yet she drove him from her; yet 
she drew her hand from his, and turned lingeringly away; and she 
let him go down through the garden, along the pathway, and across 
the valley, although with him seemed to vanish all sunlight and all 
summer from her heart. 


202 


THE SUH-MAID. 


CHAPTER XXyi. ^ 

AT ERLE’S LYNN. 

Lady Anna Erle had scarcely time to recover from the shock of 
her son’s letter, written to her from the Rue de Lycee, Pau, on the 
evenino; before the pinic to St. P— , when she received a telegram 
from Boulogne, announcing his return. 

Gilbert w^as coming home — straight home, it seemed to him — in a 
direct course from the chalet on the coteaux to the parlc-gates of 
Erie’s Lynn. He never paused from the moment when he held 
Madame Zophee's hand for the last time, and bent over her in broken 
words of farew'ell on the lawn, outside her window, until he reached 
his home. 

He stood in his room in the Rue de Lycee that morning only just 
long enough to give directions to his servant, and to write a few 
parting words to Morton and to his aunt. He felt he could not see 
any of them, he had sp little to say. He must carry Madame Zophee’s 
secret along with him, and his own suffering it was quite need- 
less to tell. They could not comfort him ; they could do little for 
him; they could not ^en understand the full reason of his despair. 
He could tell them nothing, and he shrunk from the thought of 
their sympathy, and their questions, and all their kindly concern. 

So he made up his mind, and by twelve o’clock he was ready. 

“ Take this letter to Monsieur le Vicomte de St. Hilaire; and fol- 
low me to England with the horses to-morrow.” 

This was all he said in order or explanation to his servants, and 
then, by the midday mail to Paris, he was gone. 

By the time the cold twilight of spring was falling on the park 
and throwing chill shadows across the large drawing-room at Erie’s 

Lynn, the tliird morning after the picnic to St. P , Lady Anna 

was expecting her son. 

She sat, awaiting him in a frame of mind more easily conceived 
than depicted, for the thought of the news that he w^as probably 
bringing with him was almost more than she could bear. 

Lady Anna Erie, as has been already said, was a strong-willed 
and narrow-minded woman. All her life-long she had been very 
limited in the range of her observation, and her opportunities for 
the study of varieties in national character had been few. She had, 
nevertheless, formed her opinions, and she had formed them with 
energy and force. Her views on most subjects were most depided 
and unalterable; and they were conservative, insular, and sectarian 
to a degree. Her esteem for her own opinions was, moreover, very 
high and unassailable — little open to enlightenment, conversion, or 
change; and on the subject of foreigners, and especially of foreigners 
of her own sex, she had formed views that were very unfavorable 
and very strong. For foreign religions, and indeed, for any religious 
thought differing in any way from her own and the Rev. Mr. Ray- 
broke’s, she had no toleration whatever. 

It may, therefore, be easily conceived that her son’s letter had 
filled her with unspeakable horror. 


THE SUN- MAID. 


203 


“That outlandish woman” — the only term her mind suggested 
by which to call poor Madame Zophee — appeared in vivid and” terri- 
ble colors to her imagination, and her heart grew angry, hard, and 
chill, at the thought of “this foreigner,” “ this woman of Baby- 
lon,” “this worshiper of unknown gods,” being brought one day 
to Erie's Lynn, and placed there upon the throne that had so long 
been hers ! 

This center fact in Gilbert’s letter had been the one thing on which 
her mind had seized. He was bringing her home a daughter, his 
wife, and one chosen by himself in full freedom of selection, and 
not chosen under guidance from her. And this woman of strange 
religion, and barbarous language, and outlandish name, to take her 
place and reign where she had reigned — over Gilbert’s heart and life, 
and over all the wide domain and territories of Erie’s Lynn! 

This was the one point which had touched her in his long, strange 
letter. All the poetic ardor and the strong filial affection, and the 
sweet ring of youth and love that had colored every sentence and 
word, had quite escaped her. Such effusions from Gilbert were 
unfamiliar; such outpourings of feeling and hope and desire were 
all unreadable to her cold, clear, practical perceptions ; and her one 
overwhelming terror, as she perused it all, was that, before she 
could get him home or reach him, the deed would be done. 

She had sent for her private pastoral adviser, and together they 
had read Gilbert’s outpouring, and “ youthful and impetuous in- 
deed ” had been the judgment upon his lines. The boy had got into 
bad hands, they thought, and fallen a victim to some wicked de- 
sign. What was to be done for him? 

They had no time to consider before his telegram followed hi& 
epistle; and he was expected among them at once.. 

Lady Anna awaited him in an anxious and veiy agitated frame. 
He was coming again; and alter six months she was to see him, to 
hear his ringing laugh, to meet his merry glance once more; and 
the consciousness of this filled her, in spite of all her fears and her 
forebodings, with delight. But he was coming, she remembered at 
the same time, with such news as would call for her instant disap- 
proval and reprimand. 

And she waited, ready to administer these, full of righteous in- 
dignation and wrath, just as she had awaited many a time before 
now, after boyish escapades of his, of which his tutor had com- 
plained to her, and for which she felt duty required her, on his re- 
turn from the partridge- shooting or from the river, to take him 
sternly to task. 

And indeed, much in the same spirit as she used to wait for the 
boy in those old days, she waited for the recreant now, full of dis- 
approval, and strong in the conviction of the power of her own judg- 
ment and advice. 

As the clock struck eight, and just as the old butler stepped into- 
the drawing-room to inqrrire if her ladyship would wait dinner for 
Sir Gilbert any longer, the dog-cart from the station came bowling 
up to the door, and she rose, pushed her work aside, and paused. 

There was a banging of doors, a rushing of footsteps, as the serv- 
ants burned through the hall; and still she paused. Should she go 
out to him? She had never done so in the old time when, displeased 


204 THE SUN-MAID. 

witli him. It had been her habit on such occasions to wait until he 
came to her, and so he used to corne, with reddening cheek and 
wistful, conscious eyes, and shy, boyish ways, to seek her forgive- 
ness. Why should she act differently, and go out to him now? She 
paused; and her maternal ears listened eagerly, unconsciously, for 
what she expected to hear — the quick tread of his hurrying foot- 
steps, the ring of his cheery voice through the great arched hall, his 
merry answers to the greetings of his old servants. But of all this 
she heard nothing. The doors swung and banged, there were the 
sounds of the footmen hurrying to and fro, and then, just as she 
■was springing forward to obey the impulse at length that urged her 
to go to meet him at his own house-door, the sound of his footsteps 
reached her, not hastening eagerly as in the old impetuous days, but 
coming with heavy, slow, measured tread up the hail toward her 
drawing-room door. 

Then it opened, and he entered, and for one instant all anger and 
disapproval, and all possible shadow between them, were forgotten, 
and she sprung eagerly to his arms. 

“ My son, Gilbert — my son!” 

She put up her hands to infold him with strong, irrepressible ten- 
derness, and Gilbert put his arm round her and drew her close to 
him, and bent forward and kissed her white forehead several times 
before he spoke a word. 

Then she pushed him back from her, and took his hand, and 
looked into his face with quick impulse of astonishment as he said, 
“ Yes, mother, here 1 am — come home again;” but so gently, so 
gravely he spoke to her that she paused before she answered, and 
looked up at him again. 

There was no rush of boyish fervor to be quelled and driven back 
by her disapproval; there w^as no outbreak of youthful merriment 
to be subdued by studied coldness, until her lecture had been given 
as in old times and her forgiveness obtained. There was only quiet 
tenderness in his manner to her, and in his eyes as they met hers 
there was no laughing light to be extinguished at all. They were 
stern as her own eyes, they were dim and weary, and very sad and 
grave. 

” Gilbert,” she murmured again at length, as he bent once more 
to kiss her, and drew her gently with his arm round her toward the 
seat by the fire. 

“ 1 have come home, you see, mother,” he went on, with a sud- 
den effort, ” after all, you see— after all your fears, and after all the 
.perils of travel, and all the risks of adventure. Here 1 am, come 
back to you; and I find you well, mother?” he added. “ 1 hope so; 
you look well.” 

” 1 am quite well,” she said. “ Only sad, Gilbert, and anxious.” 

” Sad! To have me back again?” he said, with a little laugh. 
Then he put her into her chair, and stood in front of her, and looked 
round the room with all its familiar furnishings and well-known 
aspect, and tried to smile down upon her, and to shake the depres- 
sion and embarrassment from his manner. 

” 1 think I am very glad to be home again,” he said, after a min- 
ute or two, during which she had inspected him, and tried to under- 


THE SUH-HAID 205 

Stand the change,, and sought in her own mind for a sentence with 
which to begin her inquiries and her reprimandatory remarks. 

He gave her no time to begin. Before she had done wondering 
vaguely at him, he began again. 

“1 have come straight through, mother, from Pau direct; left 
the day before yesterday in the forenoon, and slept in town last 
night; and so here I am. I think 1 am glad to be home again. How 
odd the old place looks! how familiar! and yet how long ago it 
seems since I went away!” 

” It seems long to me, Gilbert, 1 assure you.” 

“ Does it? I hope you have not been dull? No, no; 1 am sure 
not — with Mr. Ray broke to keep you company. You did not ex- 
pect me back for six months, mother, when 1 went away, did you? 
Only you thought 1 should have seen so many places, and have 
traveled so far, and, after all, Pau has been the limit of my jour- 
neyings. And yet — 1 think 1 have traveled a long way too,” he 
added, with a quick, restless sigh, “ along the road of life, at all 
events.” 

” 1 hope, my son, that your journeyings have been of benefit to 
you,” she began, gravely. 

” Benefit — I don’t know — i always thought it a bore, you know,” 
he said, a little wearily, ‘‘ new people and new scenes. I think 1 am 
delighted to be in the old home again, mother, and I dare say I shall 
soon settle down.” 

Settle down ! That was an alarming expression. Lady Anna felt. 
Surely, she thought to herself, they were getting near the point. 
Still he said nothing to her; he looked restlessly about him and out 
of the window, and then he turned and stretched his hands before 
the dull-buming fire. 

“I don’t like coal so well as wood,” he said, suddenly, after a 
moment’s pause, in which his mind had evidently traveled a long 
way, made a quick comparison, and come back again. 

” My dear boy,” she began, in answer, ” it is quite natural, quite 
what I expected, what 1 dreaded — in fact, what I may say 1 have 
always feared — that everything that you have left behind you in 
those foreign parts (where 1 never advised that you should go) may 
have dangerous attractions for you, that may draw you from the 
path of duty and habit which lies at home.” 

A solemn answer to a lightly made remark! But he took it quite 
naturally, being accustomed to his mother and her sayings. 

‘‘Not everything,” he said, with a short laugh;, and then he 
turned to move away. 

A loud bell rang in the distance somewhere breaking on his ear 
With a familiar clang. It was the bell in the stable- tower, ringing 
the approach of his mother’s punctilious dinner-hour. 

He turned at the sound, and moved languidly across the room. 

Then she rose and followed him. Eagerness, impatience, wonder 
over the curious change that had come to him, over the new 
reserve in voice and manner, over the gravity of his expression and 
tone, were overcoming all recollection, of her anger at last. Words 
of reprimand were passing out of her mind, and words of anxious 
inquiry were welling up in their place. 

He turned to leave the room. They had said now as much to 


THE SUis'-MAID. 


206 

each other — at least she to him — as she had ever said on former oc- 
casions, when he had come back to her after short separations from 
time to time; and he would have left her now, and gone off to find 
his own way up to his usual haunts — to his room, or his stable, or 
his kennel — where he had wandered about, and lived among his 
dogs and his horses, and the interests of his sports and ainusements,. 
^ through many a by-gone day. But his mother stopped him. 

“ Gilbert, Gilbert,” she said, laying her hand on his arm, with a 
quick, impetuous movement, quite unusual to her, “ Gilbert, speak 
to me — tell me— what you have to tell.” 

He turned and looked at her for a moment, with surprise, with a 
sudden light of suffering at her words flashing from his eyes. 

" “To tell you?” he said, in a low, hard tone; “to tell? Why, 1 
have nothing to tell.” 

“ Nothing? Gilbert, vhat do you mean*? What have you done? 
What has happened? You wrote to me— ” 

“1 wrote to you,” he exclaimed, starting back a step, and looking 
at her for a moment, with a sudden gleam of recollection breaking 
over his face. “ 1 wrote to you, mother?” 

“ Y"ou wrote to me that you loved — that you meant to marry — a 
strange, outlandish woman, whose name I had never heard, whose- 
_ religion was a horror to me, whose tongue 1 could not speak, 
whose—” 

Lady Anna had found voice at last, and her feelings came pouring 
forth without choice of epithet or restraint. But Gilbert arrested her. 

“ Stop, stop, mother!” he said, with a voice full of pain, and with 
a sudden sternness of manner that hushed her in spite of herself. 
“ Stop,” he continued, in a low, wondering tone. “ I had quite 
forgotten that letter — it seems so long ago. Yes, mother, of course 

— the night before — the night before we went to St. P , you 

know— of course — I wrote to you.” 

“You wrote to me,” she burst out again, “ and you broke my 
heart with the cruel tidings that, unknown to me, unsanctioned by 
me, you had — ” 

“ Hush, mother, hush,” he said, very gently again, “ all this is 
unnecessary. Nothing is as you fear,” he added, with a little, bit- 
ter, sarcastic laugh, “ nothing — it is over — you need not agitate or 
vex yourself for one instant now.” 

“ Over!” she exclaimed; and then she started back, and looked up 
into his face as he stood before her, and she noted the pate shade 
falling over his cheek, the dark circles round his eyes, the lines, 
deep and strong, drawn across his forehead, and the curious quiver 
of pain upon his lips ; and she remembered suddenly then the happy 
words of his long letter, the sunshine of love that had gleamed upon 
every page, the joy, and the youth, and the brightness of the whole, 
that had provoked her so sorely, prepared her for bitter trial, and 
filled her with anger and pain. 

She had prepared herself indeed for a meeting very different from 
this with her boy. What did it all mean? Was the trial spared her? 
And was the suffering his? 

“ But, Gilbert,” she said, “ you Tvrote to me about some woman 
— about something — ” 

“ Mother,” he said, quietly, “1 am at home but ten minu' 1 


THE SUN-MAID. 


207 


am very tired, I think perhaps too weary to know what 1 really think 
or feel or want to say. Will you spare me, and say nothing to me — 
nothing about what 1 wrote to you— nothing at all? Will you, 
mother— because 1 ask you— will you be patient with me for just a 
little while?” 

And then he turned to her, with a smile so wistful and so sad 
upon his lips, and with eyes so weary and laden with pain, that 
Lady Anna’s heart woke up suddenly within her beneath his glance, 
and she clasped her hands together, and looked with a quick gleam 
of sorrow, of sympathy, of compassion, breaking irresistibly forth 
from her stern, gray eyes. 

He was her son— her boy— her only one, her bright, beautiful 
darling, and as such he lived in her stern, deep heart, though she 
never called him, to her inner self, by such fond, foolish names. 
His very brightness had been a sin to her in the old days, and her 
conduct toward him had been ruled by duty, and stern duty alone. 

But now that all the brightness was gone, she sought for it with a 
new, strange feeling of longing to see that sweet joy-glearn of youth 
in his eyes once more; and in her heart, breaking and yielding for 
him, the guide of duty seemed of no more use. 

Love was calling out in sympathy for him, eager mother-love 
welling up at last, in bitter mourning for his mourning, and in 
strong sorrow for his pain ; and as he looked at her, and the expres- 
sion of her feeling for him bioke forth upon her lips and in her 
deep-set eyes, it met him with an effect of comfort, soothing curi- 
ously but strongly, because — she was his mother, and he was in 
pain. And he read tne look, and answered it, and smiled upon her 
with wistful thankfulness. He put his arm round her, and kissed 
her softly and gravely once more, and murmured, “ Mother, mother, 
it is good to be at home again. Do not speak yet of her, for 1 can- 
not; but have patience with me, and I will tell you all of the story 
that is mine.” , . , , 

And no later than that evening, as they sat together m the large, 
grim old room that had always recurred to Gilbert’s mind in such 
strong contrast to the drawing-room at St. Hilaire, he told her all 
that, as he said, was his to tell. And Lady Anna, really sorry for 
her boy, did her best to listen with patience, while he dwelt with 
loving, lingering words on the likeness of Madame Zophee which he 
drew for her in colors glowing with his ardent love. 

Lady Anna strove with admirable persistency to veil her satisfac- 
tion when the climax came, and she heard that, for reasons unre- 
vealed to her, that strange, outlandish heroine of her son’s dreams 
would probably never come to reign as mistress in Erie’s Lynn, or 
rule over that life which hitherto had been spent in quite exclusive 

devotion, her own. i ^ * 

She veiled her feelings as best she could, but it was almost too 
much for her; and she shook her head, in spite of herself, when he 
told her of Madame Zophee’s virtues and spiritual charms, of her 
honest religious devotion, of her sweet piety, of her high standard, 
of her singleness of heart. . , ^ t. 

“ 1 can never regret 1 have known her, he said, whatever hap- 
pens— even if 1 never see her again. To love her is to love every- 
thing, mother, that is high and beautiful and true; to love hei is to 


THE SUK-MAID. 


208 

have loftier views of o>!fr own life, of selfishness, of duty, of right 
and wrong.” 

So he talked for many hours, and Lady Anna wondered over him, 
saying little, sorrowing often, but rejoicing much. 

“ Butl mean to get over it, mother, you know,” he said at length, 
as he rose at a late hour to go to his room. ” I promised her to get 
over it— not to let it crush or destroy tiie energy of my life. She 
would despise me if I did that, and I should despise myself. After 
a little time, you will see, 1 shall get over it. Only, mother, never 
try to say anything against her again.” 


CHAPTER XXVll. 

LOVE THE CONQUEROR. 

“I WILL get over it,” said Gilbert, as he left his mother that 
night. ” 1 will get over it; or, at all events. I’ll try.” 

And so he did try; for it was not in him to yield to a weak, wail- 
ing indulgence of his grief. His old, active habits came back natu- 
rally to him, and almost immediately he returned to them all again. 

He set vigorously to work on the very morrow, and tried to be as 
interested as he was active about his place — he tried his very best. 

He shot, he fished, he rode, he went hither and thither across the 
length and breadth of his lands. He threw himself into it all as ar- 
dently (so he told himself) as if he had never been away. He worked 
as he had never worked before at. the business and interests of his 
property, and he plunged into every kind of enterprise and occupa- 
tion within his reach." 

He had never fished so much, never ridden so far; he had never 
been so often seen in the country town, at business meetings, across 
the farmers’ fields, along the roads, and on the market square. He 
seemed constantly occupied, and full of interests, as if returning in- 
deed with renewed energies to familiar ways. Yet, as he went to 
and fro among the people, all remarked of him that he was changed. 
High and low, from the keeper who carried his fishing-basket, 
and the groom who led round his horse, to the farmer whose 
hand he shook in his hearty way at the open gate when he 
rode home of an evening, or the old country squires who met 
him in the town, all observed the same thing. ” Sir Gilbert Erie 
was changed;” “he was not the same man,” they said of him; 
” what has come to him in these foreign parts?” 

What had come to him? Often enough he asked the question of 
himself, striving to understand and overcome it. For none of them 
all knew, as he himself knew, how much he was really changed; 
for the great change was within him. And as time w^ent on, more 
and more fully he realized it. 

He was quite unconscious that his cheek had paled and lost its 
flush of ruddy youth; that his eyes had become grave; that a look of 
age had swept across his countenance, and quite driven that cheerful 
gleam of boyish insouciance away; but this he knew — that, strive as 
he would, it was quite gone from icithin him ; that all enjoyment, 
all good, all enthusiasm had been swept out of the elements" of his; 


THE SUK'MAID. 


209 


life. He could not get over it. Month after month it became worse 
ior him, till it seemed in vain to strive. It never left him, not for 
one moment, during all that time — the presence within his heart of 
lier quiet, dreamy face, the echo of her voice, the reflection of her 
smile. It came back to him unceasingly, and the longing and the 
hunger with which it filled him at times quite overcame him with its 
weary pain. 

He was at home, and all seemed so familiar around him ; every- 
thing was surely here calculated, as he told himself, to restore him 
to his old indiflterence to any other world, to his quondam condition 
of complacency and satisfaction Avith himself. But all completely 
failed. 

Love had taken hold of him, and absorbed entire, strong posses- 
sion of his heart. That love of his — that seemed often to himself, as 
he suJBtered under it, wonderful as it Avas new — love for ‘ ‘ a stran- 
ger,” as his mother said, a little foreigner of sweet, sad face and 
dusky hair Avho had no part in any of his old life here, and had 
never had any share in the interests or occupations of his home. 
How had she stolen the heart out of this old life for him? How 
had she bewitched away all that once had been himself ? For she 
had done it — not one bit of heart had he brought back with him for 
anything that he found at home. 

His nature had always declared itself single, with a curious one- 
ness of devotion, and concentrated eagerness of enthusiasm for any- 
thing light or serious with Avhich he had to do; and single it still 
proved in this new devotion — single, undivided, and changeless in- 
deed. Every thought was colored by his memories; every incident 
in the daily routine of his life contained something to carry heart 
and association back to their unfailing center on the Pyrenees. It 
never for one moment forsook him. 

If he went out of a morning, as the bright summer came hasten- 
ing on, and saw the sun fall in broad gleams of rosy light across the 
sward in his mother’s garden, and upon her stiff parterres of flow- 
ers, the sunshine mocked him, and the scent of the flowers came up 
to him laden with bewildering pain; for he was once again instantly 
in memory with his friend in the garden on the coteaux slopes ; and 
sunshine, and the scent of flowers, and the jjoy of summer, without 
her, had no charm, nor any sAveetness for him. 

When he AA^ent oft alone with his basket and fishing-rod, which in 
these days was Avhat he liked best to do, he would tread lightly as 
he went, feeling for a few minutes that the freshness of the woods, 
and the interest of his sport, and the beauty of his own glistening 
river, which he had loved his whole life long, could bring him pleas- 
ure once more, and he would seem to en joy himself for a moment at 
least. But then it would escape him ! He would cast his line, and, 
as it floated away over the gleaming surface of the stream, he would 
forget it all— the sport, the fish he expected, the hook he Avas bound 
to watch — for hev face would rise for him through the flickering 
shades and over the dancing water; aii^ his thoughts would wander 
away and his heart seem to break anew with his bitter longings 
while his line sunk idly to the river’s bed, and was entangled, in the 
gray lichen-covered stones ere he even remembered to draw it in or 
to recast it, 


210 


THE SUK-MAID. 


And so it was with him, day after day. 

After that first evening he never spoke to his mother of Zophee— * 
iiot again, at least, till many months had gone by. He was silent 
while the struggle was still upon him, while he was proving in his 
own heart whether will and energy could extinguish love. He went 
in and out before her during this tigie, hiding his misery as he best 
could, making no complaint, letting her think him busy, interested, 
and falling again into the wa3"s of home. And he only appeared 
altered to her in that he was more serious, much aged, no longer 
frivolous and ever laughing as in the former days; but grave, con- 
cerned, and always occupied, commanding from her, as from every 
one, silence, compliance, and respect. 

She could hardly define the change that had come between them, 
but she felt it, and accepted it without a word. She saw him go out 
daily, riding, fishing, or driving, full of business, going here and 
there, and she congratulating herself as remembering “ the Babylo- 
nish woman,” was silent, with strange discretion, from the very full- 
ness of her satisfaction, thinking all was well. For she saw him 
often spring vigorously, as of old, into his saddle and ride away; 
and she watched often the firm, swinging step with which he went 
off across the lawn, and she thought, certainly, as months wore on, 
that his love was forgotten, and his heart full of his old pursuits and 
amusements, because he was silent, and this much was all she saw. 
She never knew how the rein dropped and the horse went stumbling 
idly along over many a mile of the road, while Gilbert quite forgot 
him, nor heeded where he went. Nor did it occur to Lady Anna to 
wonder, as others did, when again and again the fishing- basket came 
empty home. He hid all his sufferings from her ; he worked hard, 
and lie struggled hard; he did his best, but not for one single day 
did he ever really succeed. He could not — could not forget her! his 
friend, his little Russian love, far away from his English home, sol- 
itary on her mountains. He could not forget her, not for one day 
or hour. 

They wrote to him, of course, all this time from St. Hilaire, let- 
ters full of perplexity and dismay at his disappearance and eagerness 
for his return. And these letters, coming occasionally throughout 
the summer, nearly drove him mad. And Madame Zophee herself 
wrote once— in the deep anxiety of her heart for his well-being and 
comfort; she wrote gentle, earnest words, breathing tenderness and 
concern for him irrepressibly in every line, and begging once again 
his forgiveness ; beseeching him to forget her, and take comfort, to 
have courage and strength and confidence in his life. 

And he thought heiMetter did him good; and so it did for a little 
while. It was such wonderful happiness to see her handwriting, to 
read-again and again the sweet, exhorting words. There was such 
a true echo of herself in them. But he was worse, far worse than 
«ver, in consequence, after a time, for the longing broke over him 
so bitterly, and with such an energy of acute pain— the longing to 
see her again, to be with her, to hear her voice, to hold her hand once 
more. It all nearly made a child of him for one whole, miserable 
day, and made him utterly ashamed of his own weakness and of 
himself. Then it was that the realization came to him tiiat all his 
efforts had failed. 


THE SUK-MAID. 


211 


Then he knew in his own heart that they were of no use ; that life 
without her held nothing for him, and that love, and disappoint- 
ment, and pain, and parting, and weariness had quite broken him 
down. He knew then that fate had met him out there on the 
Pyrenees, and that it was vain to fight against its decrees; that the 
fate had come his way which meets thus sometimes strong-hearted, 
practical men of his chilly clime — men w'hose youth had passed like 
a long holiday of active and pleasant exercise, of eager though 
always external pursuits; a life of sport and energetic efforts of sim- 
ple physical force; a youth in W'hich there had been nothing 
romantic, little spiritual, and, as he now knew, no sentiment at all. 
And the fate which had met him had bewitched all this existence 
away, bcAvitched him with sunshine and radiance and beauty, and 
music and poetry, and sweetness and love. And love had got him 
fast, and quite enchained him, and he caressed with STveet and bitter 
memories his chain. 

He struggled, he made every sort of effort; but in his innermost 
heart he knew he had failed. 

It was drawing on toward early autumn at last, and the da3'S were 
at hand when Punting would be the question again, and the stud 
for the winter had to be considered and taken in. 

Of this his old groom had reminded Gilbert suddenly one August 
morning, wondering much that his master had failed in realizing 
the fact for himself; and this intelligence had roused Gilbert arid, 
affected him curiously, and had struck within him quite a new vein 
of thought. 

Hunting — winter coming again — while he had been dreaming 
away the months in his misery. Summer had come and gone, and 
he had lived life and done his work hardly and honestly, and now 
he must begin to hunt again. 

“ Good God!” he thought, “what a round it was, and how he 
hated it all!” How utterly and hopelessly insupportable it had be- 
come to him, this whole monotonous routine of his life ! Its changes 
and its seasons had no longer any interest for him. In this groove 
of weary monotony life could not be borne. 

There was something in the native impetuosity of his nature that 
waked up suddenly under this realization, and rebelled within him 
against a passive submission to his fate. A life which implied such 
suffering for him, could not, he felt within his restless heai’t, be en- 
dured without resistance, wdthout some active, untiring effort to 
be made somehow, anyhow, or anywhere — for his own deliverance 
and behalf. He felt he could not sit down to suffer, dumb and un- 
resisting, alone with a dreary and monotonous existence in his old 
home. To kill the suffering had been his first effort, and to kill it 
he had tried manfully ; but it would not die. Now something else 
must be thought of. He was young and strong, eager and advent- 
urous • surely something would be done for his own deliverance with 
such qualities as these. He would stand still and si^er no longer. 
He could not conquer his love; he would stay quiet beneath its bit- 
terness no more. • ^ . . ni j 

This realization came upon him soon after receiving Madame 
Zop^iee’s letter. It came with a whole flood of new thoughts and 
ideas, and with the strong conviction that it was no good his trying; 


THE SUK-JklAID. 


212 

to go on with the routine of his old life. It was all over for him ; 
he did not care for hunting in the least, he thought; he was nol sure 
that he had ever cared for it, and if he had, he certainly could not 
tell why. 

So one morning he said to his old groom, who was much aghast 
at the information, that he would have no new hunters that year; 
that the sales at the country towns might go on quietly without him, 
for all he cared; and that his regular stud of horses might stay hap- 
pily in their pastures, in the meantime, for him. 

And that same evening, while Lady Anna sat in her usual comer 
putting the finishing touches to one of her huge gray woolen shawls, 
he came to her and sat down on a low chair, just in front of the dull 
fire,, and before she could ask him questions or start any subject of 
interest, mutual or domestic, he told her, in the quiet tones that had 
become habitual to him, that once more he was going away. 

She started, ana would have answered him with eager expostula- 
tion, but he stopped her, and went on again. 

“ 1 have done my best,” he said. “ 1 have done my best, mother, 
but I cannot get over it ; 1 cannot live without her in any sort of hap- 
piness, and I cannot resign myself to a fate of misery without one 
struggle more — not, mother, at least, until 1 am quite certain that it 
is my fate, and that it is so absolutely and inevitably for me decreed. 
And so I am going away, and you must not stop me. You must 
not wonder even, and you must not ask me where 1 go, for 1 cannot 
tell, except that I am going to travel, and that 1 think 1 shall travel 
far. I know nothing ; 1 have not clearly formed my plans yet, nor 
have 1 one distinct idea. 1 only know what 1 want to do, and that 
I mean to do it. I will write to you, however, ” he went on, “ at all 
events, as long as I can; and take care of yourself, mother, and take 
care of home, and of everything for me, till I come back again. 1 
am resolved to come to the very end of it all, and 1 will. 1 shall 
have no more uncertainty, no more clouds and confusion. 1 will 
come back, when 1 return to you, either a happy or a resigned and 
determined man. 1 cannot let all this beat me, and as it is now, it 
will do so. It is too much for me; it is crushing me down. It is 
the uncertainty and the darkness of it all. 1 cannot bear it, 1 say. 
I must clear it up; so you must have patience with me, mother, and 
just let me go.” 

And with little more explanation, and with few more words, he 
did go, taking with him her tears and her blessing, and little else 
besides ; for he left his servant, and his heavy baggage, and all in- 
cumbrances behind hirq, and he went off alone. 

He took, however, one thing that much surprised his mother— one 
thing which he had asked from her. It was a letter to that old re- 
lation of her family for whom the Duke George inquired at Pau, the 
relative who had been in former times an exalted member of the 
English embassy to Russia, long resident of St. Petersburg, and 
familiar with many persons high in Russian office, and first among 
Russian powers. 


c 


THE SUN-MAID. 


213 


CHAPTER XXVlll. 

LADY ANNA ON THE COTEAUX. 

We are at Pau again, and it is early spring. The winter has been 
cold and long ; very cold and very long indeed in England, where it 
has not yet thought of coming to an end, and very different even 
here from that sunny year which Gilbert Erie had spent in view of 
the Pic du Midi and on the coteaux of the Pyrenees. 

At Pau, however, it is yielding. The clouds are rising from the 
distant horizon, the mountains are losing that gloomy aspect they 
sometimes wear throughout such chilly winters, an aspect very 
'Ominous of recurring storm. The coteaux are beginning to smile 
again ; the pics are piercing once more a sapphire sky ; and to-day a 
burst of unwonted heat has broken suddenly upon the country, her- 
alding with soft promise and assurance the quick approach of 
spring. The heavens are cloudless, the sunlight tails bright and 
clear the heat is intense and astonishing, coming so quickly after 
the cold ; and the winter is almost forgotten already to-day, by the 
flaneurs on the Place and on the Boulevard, and by the peasants in 
the gardens and budding vineyards across the hills; for spring smiles 
to them so brightly from the sweet landscape of the coteaux, and the 
silvery summits of the mountains glisten quite marvelously in the 
glad radiance of the sun. 

It is about three in the afternoon. Numbers of people, taking 
their drives along the road through Jurangon, are turning their car- 
riagefs already, meaning to be at home again before the sun bends 
toward the mountain horizon and the heat of the day is gone. But, 
far along the route, winding its way slowly up the steep hill beyond 
Gelos, one carriage still keeps on its steady progress, going further 
and further away from Pau. The road is dusty; the strong heat of 
the midday has already dried up the pools of rain ; and as the car- 
riage has not yet reached the shadows of the coteaux, the sunshine 
beats down upon it very hot and fierce. The horses seem tired, and 
the coachman sleepy; for he slouches upon his box, and nods his 
head, and only raises his eyes drowsily from time to time, to glance 
stupidly around him, as if he did not quite know where he was 

f oing, and as if he were sulky, moreovei, and did not much care. 

[is companion on the driving seat did not seem very capable of 
guiding him, to judge by Jiis expression of countenance, which was 
emphatically characteristic of bewilderment and much general dis- 
s<itisi*£ictioii 3*s 

He was a stout, pompous, highly respectable, and, indeed, rather 
ecclesiastical-looking personage, with a fine rubicund countenance 
that shone brilliantly in the sun. He was very scrupulously attired, 
wearing an unexceptionable hat, a large great-coat with high velvet 
collar beneath which a vast white cravat was folded carefully away. . 
He sat, silent and stolid, by the coachman’s side, looking straight 
before him, with one hand resting on each knee; his whole aspect 
evinced the contradictory sentiments that were tormenting his soul: 


THE SUN'-MAID. 


214 

expostulations of judgment combating the submission of conscience, 
and the repugnance in his person to the proceeings generally, sub- 
mitting hardly to the necessities of his position and of the case. 

He was a first-class butler en wyage, and a butler who had never 
been en wyage before. Evidently he did not like it.^ 

Inside the carriage — her figure drawn to its full height and stiffest 
angle, her head protected from the sun-glare by a large umbrella, 
her neck strained to catch as much of the view of the long road be- 
fore them as the broad shoulders of the chief functionary of her 
household would allow her to see — sat Lady Anna Erie, on the high- 
road beyond Gelos winding up the lower slope of the western co- 
teaux of the Pyrenees. 

It was about the last spot in Europe on which one might expect 
to find her, and yet here she was. She was escorted by her fat but- 
ler, and accompanied by her maid, a very acid-looking person, who 
sat with her back to the horses inside the carriage, and whose 
glances, turned disconsolately from side to side, proclaimed her to 
be neither cheered by the sunshine nor warmed into enthusiasm by 
the beauty of the view. She seemed not less discouraged than the 
functionary on the driving-box, and she looked even more grim and 
dignified under the circumstances than Lady Anna herself. 

This was an erratic move, indeed, on the part of Lady Anha Erie; 
and there were wiser people than Mr. Bullman and Mistress Red- 
bridge, at Erie’s Lynn, to whom it appeared very mysterious in- 
deed. For she had consulted no one, and had left everybody to 
wonder as he wished. The journey had been undertaken suddenly, 
and with little time for preparation or any precursory announcement 
of her plans. She had left Erie’s Lynn a week before, while the 
east wind W'as still sweeping round the old house, and the snow still 
lay in the approach. She had been there through a long winter of 
snow and keen winds, and black, drifting storm, since Gilbert had 
left her in August; and it was difficult indeed to say when the 
thought had first sprung up within her on which she was acting 
now. Probably it had come gradually — growing up from a wonder 
into a longing, that increjised to a fever of impatience, and an agony 
of apprehension and dismay. Then the sudden inspiration of an 
idea, and resolution following it with an activity and eager spirit of 
enterprise, that sprung from the fervor of her love and her anxiety, 
and from her intense strong longing and despair. For her heart was 
breaking for him — ^her son, her one boy, her lost one; to hear of 
him, to find him, to hold him in her eager embrace once more, that 
was the bitter and weary longing which had driven her from her 
fireside at Erie's Lynn, for, foi* many months, Gilbert had been lost 
to her indeed. 

The winter had been long and dreary enough, in the grim old 
drawirng-room at Erie’s Lynn, after he left her; but for some weeks 
she was fairly satisfied, for she heard from him from time to time. 
His letters came often, asd though they were short and uncommuni- 
cative, they were full of assurance of his well-being, full of concern 
for her, and full of promise of his return. He wrote little about his 
own feelings, however, and nothing about his projects or plans. 

She heard from him at first from London, where he seemed to 
linger awhile, his mind full of something, and with a purpose evi- 


THE SUN-MMD. 


215 


dently in view. From there he wrote that he had tried to hunt up 
her old relative, the quondam English embassador to Russia, but 
that, at that autumn season, he was not in town. Some days Gilbert 
seemed to spend over this search; then a letter came from him from 
Dover. He had been down into Dorsetshire, he wrote, had found 
the old embassador, had presented his introduction, and had been 
kindly received. “ But the man is an old fool,” Gilbert had tersely 
added; “he thinks everything impossible, because at his time of 
life it might perhaps be impossible to him, and he discourages me 
very much. But he has helped me all he can, nevertheless, and 
given me letters to just the very people 1 want to know ; and so now 
1 can go ahead, and to-morrow I shall once more cross the Channel. 

This much he said, and a few days afterward his mother heard 
from him from Paris. His letter from there made her feel very un- 
comfortable, filling her still further with wonder and perplexity over 


his schemes. ♦ 

“ He could not find quite the right people for his purpose in 
Paris, after all,” he^said; “ but he had come upon several who had 
been of use to him, and they were all acting very kindly, and were 
sending him prosperously on. In a day or two he would start 
again;” and, accordingly, a week later, Lady Anna heard of him 

from Berlin. „ , . . ti i 

He said very little in any explanation of his journey. Me naa 

people to hunt up,” he wrote, adding that he “ should have to stay 
there probably a while.” And, sure enough, weeks slipped away 
after that, while again she still heard from him from Berlin. He 
still lingered there; “ he could not find a man he wanted, so he 
mysteriously wrote — “ a fellow,” as he continued, to whom the 
old embassador had sent him : the man was away from Berlin; and 
Gilbert said he could not track him, and so must wait for his return. 

Several letters then followed each other, by all of which he seemed 
absorbed in this search, until, finally, “ the man was found, so he 
dulv reported, and much amazed indeed was his mother with this 
last letter, in which he disclosed the name and degree of this person- 
age for whom he had been searching with such incomprehensible 
zeal It was the General Vormonoff, a man who had been military 
chief of the Siberian Council at St. Petersburg when her old relative 
had been English embassador there. ‘ And he, Gilbert added, 
“ had been very friendly, and had handed him on, with inLoduc- 
tions and passports, to the very people wanted-themen who had 
been in similar posts of high power and .^utlioritv during later 
years and those also who held the same positions in bt. Petersburg, 
and the remoter regions of the Russian empire now. , 

What in Heaven's name, he wanted with all these extraordinary 
people was more than Lady Anna’s wildest flights of imagination 
could conceive. But that it was something connected with that 
strange and Babylonish woman ” she felt assured. She fumed more 
and more within herself as she perused these 
and, with an hourly increasing bitterness, she hated Zophee 
known cause of all this mystery and trouble. 

be doino’? He seemed in the strangest company, and engrossed in 
the most unaccountable occupations. What could it ad mean? 
Simply, “ that woman ”— so Lady Anna reiterated often to herself 


THE SUH-MAID. 


216 

— “ that strange and outlandish Tartar woman.” For what had her 
son called her— “ aTsiganie!”— pshaw! a savage, to whom Christian 
propriety and Christian religion were, doubtless, alike unappreciated 
as unknown. 

How the vision ot that dreadful woman, of savage speech and 
heathen worship, haunted poor Lady Anna throughout all that win- 
ter, painted ever by her imagination in colors most repellent and 
dark! The thoughts of this woman at Erie’s Lynn pursued her as 
a phantom of the future, and daily it seemed to become at once more 
certain and more abhorrent to her mind; for all this mystery and 
this traveling meant certainly only — her. 

And Lady Anna felt, as these mysterious letters arrived, that it 
might be coming upon her at any time now. Some morning, as she 
felt convinced, Gilbert would- announce his return, bring home with 
him his heathen bride. For what could she tell? What was he 
really doing? She did not know. And where was the outlandish 
woman all this time? And where might not he be indeed? She 
could make nothing of it at all, and dim suspi^on filled her with 
bitterness and concern. 

It was a pity that all this time Gilbert could not have been more 
frank with his mother as to his real doings and schemes ; but, as he 
said often afterward, frankness, just then, would have spoiled 
everything. He had to do what he was doing quietly, silently, and 
without interference or remark; and all this he could not possibly 
have escaped had he enlightened her, for she certainly would not 
have left him to pursue his projects, had she known them, undis- 
turbed. 

Then, habit did not propel him to frankness, nor did his con- 
science point him toward it as a duty. She had never encouraged 
him to open confidence; she had never had any sympathy with his 
sentiments, even while expressing, as on that first evening of his re- 
turn, sorrow and sympathy for himself ; she had never understood 
what she called “ his infatuation,” or never believed it as a worthy 
and real thing, and now he well knew, she would feel little sym- 
pathy with his projects, or approval of hi#plans. So he prosecuted 
them in silence, without further explanation than lay for her in these 
curt epistles of his. . 

Suddenly one of these came, announcing that he was leaving 
Berlin — that his business there was over, that he had discovered all 
he wanted tu know, and that he was starting again, and this time 
on a very long journey, the exact points of which he w^as still un- 
able to tell. He would" write to his mother, he said, on the very first 
opportunity, at his first haltng-place; and he would write, he con- 
tinued, as frequently and as unfailingly as he could. But he was 
going far, he added; and if weeks came now and then, during his 
travels, in which she might fail to hear from him, she must not 
mind, nor wonder, nor fear anything, but simply be patient, and 
believe that it was only because he could not help it, and because 
posts and letter- sending were not within his reach. 

All this, once more, filled her with unspeakable perplexity, and 
with much indignation as well. What could he mean? On what 
mad enterprise was he bent? Wliere was he going? AVhere, where— 
indeed? She could not tell, and no one could assist or enlighten her. 


THE SUH-MAID. 


217 


She laid up his letters and waited, wrathful and wondering, her 
mind full of anger at Gilbert, and of strong, ever-increasing hatred 
of the unknown woman — her enemy, the Russian, the strange 
heathen who had led him so far astray; and, week after week pass- 
ing wearily, found her waiting still. 

For, from that day, she heard of him no more. The winter had 
set in soon afterward at Erie’s Lynn, and a bleak and a stormy 
winter it was. And throughout the weary, dark months Lady Anna 
sat, still waiting, for a long while feeling merely bewildered and 
very angry, until, as the time rolled on, anger gave way to appre- 
hension, wonder to bitter anxiety, and then that weary longing grew 
up within her, filling her with heartfelt despair. 

By the time the year turned, indeed, she was well-nigh distracted 
with her fears and her longing, for she still heard nothing of her 
son, and as the cold early months of the year went slowly on, her 
heart saddened and sorrowed, and sunk daily lower in her solitude, 
and her longings and her fears quite overcame her, for her wander- 
ing and wayward boy. 

it was when the last 'days of February came that she suddenly 
felt, with a restless impatience (much as he had felt), that what she 
suffered could be borne no longer; that she could sit still and wait 
and wonder in patience no more; that she must do sornething; that 
she must go somewhere; that she must search for him; that she 
must start off, and never rest satisfied till he was found. This was 
the resolution that she took one lonely evening, and that she formed 
with that same strength and energy of purpose that her son had 
evinced in all his doings, and which was indeed the single part of 
her character which she had transmitted to him. 

And having taken the resolution, she reflected upon it and formed 
her plans, and proceeded to accomplish them, much also as he 
would have done, with silent energy, without assistance from any- 
body, and consulting no one at all. 

Thinking over her son’s history during the last twelve months, 
her mind suggested to her but one point to which she should direct 
her journey. The place round which his memoiy had lingered so 
tenderly, the scenes which he had brought forcibly before her by 
description so often, that they had come to represent to her imagina- 
tion the central apex of the whole continent of Europe, the one place 
at wfiich any one "who traveled could ever possibly aiTive, the coun- 
try he loved so passionately, the Bearnais capital, the town of Pau. 
There, among those wild mountains of which he had spoken, was 
the stronghold-dwelling of “ the Tartar woman;” there, by her wiles 
and devices, she had doubtless inveigled Gilbert, and there held him 
now enslaved. There too among the mountains, as Lady Anna 
vaguely imagined, dwelt that errant sister of hers, that recreant 
from their father’s faith, the giddy, reprehensible Violet of old times, 
the Marquise de St. Hilaire of to-day. j ^ j 

Gilbert, she knew, loved all of them— these merry-hearted fnends 
of his onthecoteaux of the Pyrenees. Where else, then, should 
Lady Anna journey in search of her son, and in what other direction 
could she hope to find a clew to his whereabouts, or any trace of 

himself? , . ^ i 

To Pau, therefore, she resolved to travel, accompanied by her 


THE SUK-MAID. 


218 

ancient and acidulated handmaiden, and protected hy the chief func- 
tionary of the household, who said he “ ’oped he knew his dooty, if 
others didn’t; through dangers and adventures and perils, he, at 
least, would be found by her ladyship’s side.” 

It might be edifying enough to linger for a page or two over the 
many adventures that did indeed overtake that trio, in the course of 
their week’s traveling from Erie’s Lynn to Pau — for they had gone 
through a great deal, undoubtedly — but we must not pause to do so; 
for all' this time Lady Anna, at the end of her long railway journey, 
is driving up the steeps of the coteaux, and advancing, as she im- 
agines, toward the Chateau of St. Hilaire. 

She had inquired for the marquis immediately on her arrival at 
Pau, of the English-speaking master of the Hotel de France, in 
whose omnibus she found herself and her luggage at the railway- 
station, and at whose door she finally seemed destined to beset down. 
From him she had learned that Madame la Marquise, with all her 
family, was at the chateau on the coteau, having gone over there 
from her house in the Rue de Lycee about a week before. They 
would return, doubtless, he imagined, as the season was not yel over 
in the gay world of Pau — only Lent had just begun — and he imag- 
ined Madame la Marquise had just gone to her country home for a 
short rest and change. There was nothing more, therefore, to be 
heard of her in the town evidently, and nothing at all to be seen. 
So Lady Anna, after a moment’s demur and consideration, was per- 
force constrained to comply with Monsieur Gardere’s polite entreaty, 
that she would descend from the omnibus and at least Tefresh herself 
in his house. She was “ Miladi Erie,” as ho realized from her at- 
tendant’s statements, from the address visible upon her luggage, 
and, ultimately, from her ceremonious announcement of lierself; 
and he recognized her quickly for whom she was, the sister of Ma- 
dame la Marquise de St. Hilaire, and the mother of the gallant chas- 
seur of last winter, ” Sare Geelbarte Airrl.” He gave her his best 
attention, and it was in a carriage of his procuring that, an hour 
after the arrival of the Paris train. Lady Anna was winding slowly 
along in the heat and dust and sunshine through the valley and up 
the coteaux to St. Hilaire. 

She was very tired, worn out indeed, with the unwonted fatigue- 
of a railway journey. Her mind, too, was overstrained and excited 
by all the novelty of the unfamiliar scenes through which she had 
traveled, and still more by the weight of apprehension, resentment, 
and anxiety that lay so heavy upon her heart. The way seemed very 
long as the horses dragged the heavy landau slowly up the hill. Tho 
beauty of the landscape did nothing to soothe or refresh her, for she 
seemed scarcely to observe it. Her imagination was quite proof 
against all such impressions for the time being, and full only of anx- 
iety and of pain. 

She felt angry with her sister as she drove along, angry as if the 
marquise’s offense and elopement had been of yesterday. She burst 
into new fury against that iniquitous maiTiage of long ago, which 
was indeed the remote cause that had led to all her own annoyance 
now; and very bitter indeed had her feelings grown by this time 
against that enemy whom she had never seen, the ” outlandish 
woman ” whose influence had wrought such evil in her son’s life, and 


THf: SUN-MAID. 


219 


such misery and desolation in her own. Lady Anna sat weary and 
impatient, and the cairiage wound heavily up the hill. The ascent 
became very steep at length; they were climbing over the shoulder of 
a coteau with precipitous sides, and toiling up a road that was nar- 
row and strangely rough and unpolished for a carriage-way; and as 
they mounted, pic after pec of the mountains came in view, towering 
far beyond them in the sunlight, and tuft after tuft of the woody 
<;oteaux showed their rounded heads, each crowned with the high 
sloping roofs and clustering turrets and chimneys of the chateaux, 
villas, and country residences that lay all around. 

“ Ha!” exclaimed the coachman, suddenly, with an accent of as- 
tonishment and vexation in his voice. “ Ha! there, over there, mon 
Dieu, across the valley, is St. Hilaire.” 

He stopped his horses as he spoke, shrugged his shoulders, and 
pointed with his whip to the top of a wooded hill that rose above 
their heads. It was not the coteau up which they were driving, 
however, but a neighboring one; a narrow valley with a gurgling 
rivulet in its woody depths, lay between this lipo.^ There indeed, on 
that coteau-slope, rose the Chateau de St. Hilaire, the tall turrets 
rearing themselves against the clear blue sky, the mullioned win- 
dows glistening in the golden sunshine. It loomed high above them, 
its aspect was very imposing, and it looked very quiet and still. No 
smoke rose from its chimneys, no one was moving anywhere along 
the pathways or about the door; there were no signs of life w habi- 
tation whatever. The coachman held his horses up with dithculty 
as they stood there, for the ascent was very steep, and he growled to 
liimsclf <is lie looked, ubout bim with, wonder <ind hesitation. jMr. 
Bullman, on the box, said nothing, but drew his hat gently over his 
eves as the glare of the afternoon sun came straight upon his rubi- 
cund countenance. Mrs. Redbridge shrugged her shoulders, and 
looked about her with unconcealed disgust; and Lady Anna, in the 
clear slow, curious old-fashioned French, that had lingered in 
memory from her earliest days, refreshed by systematic perusal of 
certain French works, classical and religious, asked of the surly 
coachman, ” And is that the Chateau de St. Hiliaie? 

“Yes madame,” he answeied; “but how are we to get there? 
It is oil the other side of the valley. Sacre! I have turned into the 

'^^“'rhr wrong road! Extraordinary,” exclaimed Lady Anna in 
English—” extraordinary that the man should not know his way. 

“Not know his way!” screamed Mrs. Redbridge; Ihen she added 
crnnhatically, changing her tone to one of serious and conclusive as- 
ISancr” ¥hen w?are lost-lost and betrayed: just what 1 always 
told you my lady, and now we’ll be benighted, taken up by 
biio’ands,’and carried off to them awful mountains. I always said 
it’ ^nd now mv lady, you will see.” 

’“ You are a fool, Redbridge,” said Lady Anna. Benighted 
with that sun glaring in our faces, and brigands. Pshaw ! l ou are 

^ As your ladyship pleases,” replied Redbridge, bittei;^; “ but 1 
always told you, my lady, and now you will see. ^ Yah! she 
screamed suddenly again, as the horses backed a few inches nearei 
the precipice from the weight of the carriage bearing heavily upon 


230 


THE SUN-MAID. 


them from behind, “yah! may 1 get out, please? Oh, law, my 
lady, we will be clean killed, everyone of us, in three minutes’ time! 
Please, coachman — dear Mr. Bullman — do let me get out!” 

“ Silence, woman!” exclaimed Lady Anna. “Coachman,” she 
ventured in French again, “do you really not know your way to 
St. Hilaire?” 

“ Not without turning the carriage, madame,” replied the man, 
“ and that is what it’s impossible to do here. We must go to the 
top and down the other side again, and perhaps we shall get turn- 
ing room there. Sacre!” he growled again; and then, addressing 
his horses, he shouted suddenly, at the top of his voice, “ Yee-hoop 
allez!” loosening at the same time the drag that he had placed upon 
the wheel. “ Yee-hoop!” But it was in vain; the horses had been 
out before that day, most evidently, and the hot drive across the val- 
ley had quite exhausted their remaining powers. They made one 
effort, pulled the carriage up the steep ascent a few yards further, 
then stopped, threw their heads up, and backed again. There was 
a precipice of fifty feet deep into the valley below, and with no 
parapet running along its edge on one side of them, and to this 
the hind wheels of the heavy vehicle were alarmingly near. 

Mr. Bullman sprung to his feet, and Mrs. Redbridge screamed 
lustily, and the coachman cried, “ La, la!” to his horses, and pulled 
the mechanical drag on with a quick, forcible effort again. Lady 
Anna turned a shade paler, but she sat perfectly still, with a dignity 
and composed control worthy of herself, while the carriage slowly 
stopped once more, and Mr. Bullman jumped hastily to the ground. 
His first impulse was a wise one. He picked up" the two largest 
stones he could see, and stuck them behind the carriage wheels, 
which seemed almost to totter but a few inches from the precipice 
brink; and then he came round to the carriage-door. 

“Yes, yes; get out, madame,” said their driver, with much deci- 
sion and little ceremony, before Bullman could speak. “You must 
get out, if you do not want to break j^our neck inside.” 

“ Get out !” exclaimed Lady Anna, indignantly. 

“ If your ladyship would not really mind,” said Mr. Bullman, in 
imploring accents. He stood with one hand resting on the door- 
handle, while with the other he raised his hat respectfully from his 
very dignified gray head. “ If your ladyship would not mind for a 
few minutes, till we reach the hill-top, it really would be safer, 1 
believe. ’ ’ 

“Oh, please, my lady; yes, yes,” implored Mrs. Redbridge. 
“ Do, please, my lady, let me get out!” 

“ Sit still, Redbridge,” replied Lady Anna, severely. “ What an 
execrable coward you are! Get out, Bullman?” she continued, 
turning to her old man-servant; “get out of my caniage on the 
high-road? You know — you know I never do such a thing.” 

“ But on this occasion, my lady, if your ladyship would not really 
mind.” 

“ Won’t the man drive on? Can’t you tell him, Bullman? How 
stupid you all are! Redbridge, you goose! stop that sniveling or 
get out; get out with you if you will ; but I, Bullman, 1 must say — I 
must really say it is most extraordinary.” 

“ 1 am very sorry, my lady, that your ladyship— but— ” 


THE SHN-MAID. 


221 


“ Descendez, done! descendez! get out quick, madame, if you 
please,” shouted the man from the box again, for the horses were 
throwing up their heads and showing signs of renewed eftorts to 
move; and whether backward or forward this time appeared ex- 
tremely uncertain. 

Redbridge at this point, without further ceremony, bundled hastily 
out. Fear quite overcame all awe or veneration, and, regardless 
even of her ladyship’s toes, she tumbled on to the dusty road. Then 
at last Lady Anna arose, yielding, not to her own fears indeed, but 
in obedience to the imploring look of her old functionary, and the 
peremptory coercion of the coachman from the box; and she de- 
scended, slowly and ceremoniously, leaning with as much state upon 
Bullman’s arm as if stepping from her chariot on to her own thres- 
hold at Erie’s Lynn. 

She found herself in the center then of the steep, rugged way ; 
and in a few seconds, saving her two disconsolate servants, she found 
herself there alone, for “ Yee-hoop!” the coachman cried once more 
to his horses, loosening the reins, shaking their heads violently as 
he shouted, cracking his long whip, and jangling the harness-bells, 
and suddenly away went his steeds, relieved of three solid burdens, 
away, galloping at a rattling pace, toward the summit of the hill. 
Lady Anna was left to wend her way up wearily as she best could. 

The sun was still fierce and glaring, the heat was intense, and so, 
very slowly and with halting footsteps, Lady Anna climbed the 
steep. Still more haltingly she wjis followed by her faithful but 
most discouraging attendants of whom one looked driven to the 
very outer verge of all dignity and endurance, and the other was 
hopelessly dissolved in tears. Lady Anna heeded neither of them, 
but went courageously on. She soon saw the carriage reach the hill 
top, and there the coachman waited, perhaps politely for his freight 
to catch him up and get in again, more probably to speculate as to 
what he should next do. When, after many minutes of weary 
climbing, they reached him, they found the latter was indeed the 
case; for he was now looking blankly before him at two winding, 
sloping roads that led both dosvn into the hollow below. Oue 
seemed to stretch away into the distant country, while the other dis- 
appeared into the russet woods of the valley, and looked as if it 
might possibly lead to St. Hilaire; but the man was undecided 

whether to follow it. _ , , . i ^ 

The prospect from here was splendid. Far up on the high coteau 
above them towered still in view the turrets of St. Hilaire. The 
leafless woods on the sloping sides of the little valley which lay be- 
tween them and the chateau clustered deep down and also high up 
on the opposite side; it hid the chateau, all save the highest turrets 
from their view, from where they now stood, and it grew thick and 
close round the gardens, and screened every building that might lie 
on the slopes between. Only half-way down the sides of the valley 
there rose into the still air a soft wreath of feathery smoke, floating 
away above the tops of the brown trees, and curling down the hol- 
low below them. It revealed that some house or cottage was hid- 
den snugly in the clustering wood over there; and this bit of blue 
smoke caught Lady Anna’s e^^e, as she ppsed and meditated, for it 
spoke of comfort and welcome and habitation, of some one neigh- 


222 


THE SUH-MAID. 


borly and near, of a fireside, and a cozy homestead ; it seemed to 
speak in contradiction to the still and solitary aspect of Chateau de 
St. Hilaire; and it spoke to her thus at her journey’s end, with curi- 
ous force and sweetness, that bit of curling smoke. 

“ What aie we to do?” she said to the coachman presently, for he 
did not request her to enter the carriage, and he was still looking 
confusedly around. 

Mr. Builman stood respectfully “ at ease,” a few paces behind her 
ladyship. Mrs. Redbridge had sat down by the ditch-side, and 
dried her tears. 

” Dieu sait!” the man answered, shrugging his shoulders with 
emphatic grimaces of disgust. ” I do not know my way no more 
than an owl. Whether to go up, or go down, or turn round and go 
back again, 1 cannot tell. These valleys here on the coteaux are too 
much for me, and — pardon, rnadame—but I am not of this country 
myself. 1 come from the side of the Cauteret, 1 do.” 

” As if 1 cared where you come from,” exclaimed Lady Anna, in- 
dignantly, roused at length from her wonted composure of de- 
meanor and address. ” AVhat do you mean by undertaking to drive 
a lady and a stranger to a place which you do not know?” 

The man shrugged his shoulders again. 

” Pardon, madame, but 1 thought 1 did know. I have often 
driven parties round the country this way, in view of St. Hilaire; 
and how was 1 to tell that the chateau was so difficult to reach?” 

” Bah! And now what do you intend to do?” 

“ 1 do not know,” exclaimed the coachman again, with surly re- 
signation to the inevitable; ” stay where 1 am, 1 suppose, till my 
horses are rested, then find the w'ay somehow to where madame de- 
sires to go.” 

“ Could vre not make inquiries, my lady?” murmured Builman, 
presently, from behind. ” Some of ihe rustics, my lady, such as 
we saw down the road a bit, might know the wmy to the castle. We 
might institoot inquiries, if your ladyship pleases.” 

“ Of course, yes!” exclaimed Lady Anna. “ That wdll be the very 
best thing to do. But I see no peasants now, Builman.” 

” Perhaps, my lady, from his elevated position the coachman 
might,” insinuated Builman, discreetly. 

” Ah! yes — so! Coachman,” again she continued, addressing the 
man in French, “ why do you not inquire your way?” 

“ Ah-ha!” he said, with a sardonic laugh; ” very easy, just what 
we should do, madame, only there is no one to ask. Nothing on 
this side the valley; but — hold!” he exclaimed, suddenly, standing 
up on his box, and looking round from side to side as he spoke, as 
if the remark had inspired him with a new idea; “ah! 1 declare, 
down across the shoulder of the hill, I see one little house. If ma- 
dame would send her courier there, he might indeed find somebody 
to be our guide.” 

” An excellent idea! I see the cottage plainly,” exclaimed Lady 
Anna; and, Builman,” she continued, recovering her dignity again, 
and giving her orders with all her usual ceremony and composure, 

Builman, you will just please, step to that cottage— see, its chim- 
neys are quite visible above that low group of trees ; you will just 
step there, and present Lady Anna Erie's compliments, and say — 


THE SUK-MAID. 


223 


no, 1 forgot, not that exactly — but, please, simply state that Lady 
Anna Erie, of Erie’s Lynn, waits on the hill above here, and will feel 
obliged by their sending at once a person to show her the road to St. 
Hilaire.” 

Bullman bowed instantly his obedience, with a state and ceremony 
that rivaled her own ; but still he hesitated. 

” Your ladyship’s orders,” he murmured, “ are my law; but— a 
thousand pardons, my lady — the idea is admirable, but there is a 
little difficulty about the speech on my part — a hesitation. I am sure 
your ladyship will excuse and understand.” 

“The speech I The language, you mean. Oh, good gracious! 
Bullman, 1 quite forgot. Ah! well, the coachman must go, and 
you can hold the horses, eh?” 

“ Well, my lady,” demurred Bullman, “ if, now, it was an En- 
glish pair: but they French critturs — Indeed, my lady, 1 doubt it, 
if an accident were to occur now to impede your ladyship’s prog- 
ress— ” 

“ Pshaw! Well, what, 1 ask you, is to be done?” 

Bullman looked sadly toward the roof of the little cottage nest- 
ling in tne group of brown trees, from which their succor was to 
come, and then he glanced back at Lady Anna again. A meek 
and wistful expression came over his pompous countenance. 

“ Ah, well, it is not for me to suggest, my lady,” he said; “ but 
your ladyship has that fine command over the difficulties of the 
French tongue that 1 would almost venture to insinuate that if 1 ac- 
companied your ladyship — ” 

“ You mean to say, Bullman, that I must go myself; that is a 
pretty pass to come to. If 1 want anything done, 1 must do it; if 1 
want an errand carried, 1 must carry it myself. Well!” 

“ 1 do not see any one about the cottages,” broke in the coachman, 
impatiently, “ or 1 could shout to them from here to come; but if 
you will send your man to knock at the door or window, madame, 
it might be a good thing. For me, I cannot leave these horses, or 
they will yet have the carriage over the edge. Go, go,” he added, 
emphatically, to Bullman, pointing at the same time with much 
energy at the distant cottage roof. 

“ Come,” said Lady Anna, in a very dignified accent: and she set 
forth. Bullman stepped a few paces behind her, while Redbridge 
dragged herself up slowly from out the ditch, followed at some dis- 
tance, drying her eyes disconsolately as she went along. 


CHAPTER XXIX. 

ESCUARAN EVENING SONGS. 

Lady Anna crossed the brow of the hill, walking wearily again 
over the hot road. The sun was sinking now into gorgeous masses 
of crimson clouds that rose, piled up one above the other, away be- 
yond the furthest horizon of the mountains; the broad level rays of 
light came straight across the valleys and hill-tops, bathing the whole 
glorious landscape in a ruddy glow; and Lady Anna paused, m 
spite of herself, to exclaim and gaze as the splendor and richness 
and bewitching beauty of the scene broke for the first time upon her 

realization, as on her view. , , ^ i i -xi 

Gilbert’s enthusiasm recurred to her; her cheek flushed with un- 


THE SUN-MAID. 


224 

wonted emotion, and tears welled np unbidden to her eyes; for the 
thought came back to her of all his glovring descriptions, of his 
passionate enthusiasm, of his tenderness for this, as he had once 
called, “ the paradise of his romance.” It all rushed over her, full 
of thrilling memories. And these were Gilbert’s mountains! these* 
the snowy peaks in which he had so delighted, the smiling sunlit 
valleys he had loved so well, the land of his dreams, the home of 
his heart, the shrine of all his devotion ; there it lay, outstretched in 
its richness, and its glory, and its beaut}', before her now. At last 
she almost echoed his enthusiasm, as her heart beat, and her tired 
eyes wandered across the valleys and the coteaux tops toward that 
glorious horizon, where the snowy crests pierced the evening sky. 

In the foreground, a little down the hill among the trees, lay the 
cottage; and, after a few moments’ pause. Lady Anna walked on 
again, and went straight toward it. It was a low-roofed, poor little 
place, with gray-marled walls; a deep porch, and low-latticed win- 
dows. A straggling vine-garden led up to it; a shaggy goat browsed 
on a plot of grass close to the door ; some red earthen pots stood 
about under the porch-leads; a thin blue smoke rose from the chim- 
ney. The house was evidently inhabited, though no one "was to be 
seen. It was poor and comfortless; but a wild, picturesque little 
spot, the grand background of the mountains rising all around it, 
and the broad rays of the sunset bathing it in crimson light. 

If you please, my lady, shall 1 knock?” said Bullman, as Lady 
Anna still paused. “ The ’ouse do seem inhabited, to judge from, 
the bit of smoke, but it is astonishing quiet.” 

“Ah, hush!” exclaimed Lady Anna, as her footstep trod the 
threshold, and she paused again, ior Bullman’s discreet speech and 
suggestion had been interrupted by a sound that at that moment 
stole out softly upon her ear. “ Hush! hush!” she said again, and 
she remained still and listened. 

It was the low sound of singing that reached her, coming from ' 
within the little humbledoor, of singingso sweet, so soft, so music- 
al, and so wonderfully sympathetic that Lady Anna, whose nerves 
were already touched by the fatigue and excitements of her journey, ^ 
and by the heart-thrilling associations and influence of that glorious 
sunset vieAv, listened, hushed and arrested, with a wonderful echo 
of softened feeling moving somewhere deeply within her and glis- 
tening in the reflection of her eyes. She was veiy tired, she thought, ' 
and that was surely vdiy the simple song, the cooing strains of 
a peasant-woman, doubtless hushing her child to sleep, should thus 
touch her so strangely; but truly, it was very beautiful, and in si- 
lence she remained listening still, the notes of the soft voice stealing ' 
out to her. It was, as she imagined, a Basque peasant-song: 

“ Ichusou urac haudi, 

Eztu ondoric agueri,” 

were the words that came floating out to her chanted to that music ' 
of the mountains that is at once so soothing and sympathetic, so 
wild and sweet and strange; it was, in truth, a song that the peas- ^ 
ants of the far-away ranges or the Escuara gypsies sing on such 
sunset evenings to soothe the little children to sleep. 

“ Pasaco ninsaqueni audio 
Maitea ienstea gatic.” 


THE SUK-MATD, 


225 

came the thrilling cadence, rising and falling again and again, and 
Lady Anna listened. A few minutes and then suddenly, with 
quickened curiosity she pushed the door gently open, just a little 
way — she saw into the room. Then again she paused, she slightly 
started, and stepped backward and was silent again. She had 
opened the door so quietly that she had been unheard, and the sing- 
ing w'ent on still, and it continued so thrilling and so sweet, that It 
was little wonder she shrunk from interrupting it: besides, the scene 
before her was strange and unexpected enough to induce her thus 
to pause and gaze. 

Through a small lattice on the western side the sun-rays streanred 
into the little square room, bathing the inmates with a warm, golden 
glow; it touched everything, all the poor little humble piece of 
furniture, with bright color and light; it glistened on the copper 
pans and platters on the shelves ; it deepened the red tints of the 
earthen dishes, the jugs and water-cruches of quaint classical form 
that stood about on the table and on the ground. It seemed quite 
to extinguish the luster and flame of a small log-fire that burned in 
the black chimney; it lighted up the picturesque figure and brightly- 
colored petticoat and kerchief of a peasant-woman, who stood with 
her back turned to Lady Anna in the center of the room; it fell in 
warin, soft rays across a rough wooden bed in which lay, apparently 
sleeping, a sick and pain-worn child; and it crowned as with a halo 
of glory the dusky hair and uncovered head of a young and grace- 
ful w'oman, who sat, her face turned also from the door- way, chant- 
ing her sweet music by the sick child’s bed. Both she and the 
mother, for surely she was the mother, that peasant who stood there, 
her whole attitude speaking watchful anxiety and concern, botn 
were so occupied in watching the little suffering one as she dropped 
asleep under the soothing power of that soft-rippling voice, that 
they did not notice that the door had opened, nor that any one stood 
watching them there. The lady sung on, sitting perfectly still and 
absorbed, a curious and lovely picture — that halo of the golden sunset 
resting upon her waving hair, her long skirts sweeping the ground 
beside her, her hat laying on a stool a few yards away, her graceful 
figure bending, her hands clasped upon her knee, her head moving 
gently to and fro with the floating rise and fall of the low, soft ca- 
dence if her song. 

Suddenly the peasant-woman moved, some sound from without, 
from Bullman or Redbridge, in their desolation, in the distance, 
must have reached her ears ; she moved, she turned, and she saw 
Lady Anna. 

“Cielo!” she exclaimed, in her Basque tongue, and in a low, 
suppressed voice of surprise, “ Cielo! madame, what will you? Do 
you want to enter here?” And she sprung forward, with a glance 
of anxiety toward her child, fearful lest it should be disturbed. 

At the same time, with the instinctive hospitality of her race, she 
threw the door open, and at her exclamation and movement the sing- 
ing ceased, for at that instant the lady had also heard. She hushed 
her song, she turned round, and the unknown faces of Lady Anna 
Erie and Mr. Bullman met her eye. In a moment she had sprung 
to her feet. Who they were, what they wanted at that hour, and at 
that distance from the town, she could not know, but still she hur- 
8 


THE SUN-MAID. 


226 

ried forward without delay. Enough; she saw strangers and En- 
glish, as she detected before she spoke one word, and it was her 
duty to arrest them. She came quickly forward, and without the 
slightest hesitation, laid her hand upon Lady Anna’s arm. 

“Will you be so very kind as to tell me,” began that lady, in her 
slow and very stumbling French; but she had scarcely time to say 
even so much before those two soft, eager hands were clasped eag- 
erly over hers ; she Avas drawn back, with gentle force and determi- 
nation, into the garden, and a clear voice was saying to her in rapid 
accents, and in English almost as pure as her owm: 

“ You must not go in there; pardon me, madame, but indeed you 
must not; that poor child is ill — very ill, I fear — with a most malig- 
nant fever, and the doctor assured me no one can with any safety 
breathe the air of the room. You must not go in.” 

“ A malignant fever!” screamed Mrs. Redbridge, who, at the ap- 
pearance of that elegant-looking little lady, had come hastily within 
ear-shot of where she stood. “ Malignant fever, indeed! My lady, 
my lady, what next?” And she beat a rapid retreat again toward 
the garden gate. 

“ Ahem, my lady!” began Bullman also, stepping briskly back- 
ward from the perilous proximity of the door. 

But Lady Anna heeded neither of them; she was listening still to 
the rapid, eager accents of the unknown speaker, and she was gaz- 
ing, having not yet uttered a word, upon the strange, unfamiliar 
loveliness of the countenance, as the stranger stood, her hands still 
clasping Lady ‘‘Anna’s, her eyes glowing in the sun-rays, full of 
earnest expression, and deep and clear in their reflection as two 
limpid wells of light. 

“You must not go in,” she repeated, her voice falling with a 
soft, musical intonation, and with a slight foreign acccent, upon 
the last syllable of her words. “ You must not go in.” 

“ And yet,” said Lady Anna, softly, answ’^ering the vivid, speak- 
ing expression of the countenance more than the words, and seem- 
ing to give utterance within herself to the quick strange impression 
its singular beauty had made upon her, “ and yet you have been in 
there.” 

“ 1? Ah, yes; why not?” she answered, turning her face a little 
away, with a quiet look of curious pain flashing across it; “ what 
does it matter (for me? And then she turned again and looked 
straight up at Lady Anna, and another expression, a sudden gleam 
of surprise, of inquiry, of perplexity, came over her face. She 
scanned the cold, handsome countenance before her, and noted the 
clear-cut features, the curl of the lip, and the droop of the eyes. 
Was it a countenance unknown to her? Had she never looked upon 
the fine-drawn outlines of these Deningham features before? She 
gazed w^onderingly an instant, and then she spoke again. 

“ Can 1 do anything for you, madame? Do you want an}' one? 
Are you not in search of something, that you stop on your evening 
drive to open this cottage dooii Can I do anything for you?” 

Then it came flashing out upon her, suddenly and instantly, the 
cold brilliancy of the beautiful Deningham smile, the smile that on 
Gilbert’s Ups so resembled his mother’s, though she rarely reflected 
the sweet, kin** light of his bright-blue eves. 


THE SUis^-MAID. 


227 

Lady Anna bowed courteously now, and with a rapid flash her lips 
parted and her face lighted up for a moment, and in that smile her 
questioner recognized her before she spoke another word. The two 
eager hands that had clasped Lady Anna’s relaxed their hold, and 
dropped slowly away, and the lady retired back a step, and looked 
up with irrepressible astonishment in her gaze. Her lips parted, 
and seemed to tremble with mute consternation as Lady Anna, still 
courteously smiling, proceeded to say, “ You can certainly do some- 
thing for me if you will be so very kind ; though, indeed, the com- 
fort of finding you here to speak English to me seems to demand so 
much gratitude for the moment as to make me forgetful of every- 
thing else. Hut you can, indeed, help me.” 

” Will you command me?” murmured the other again, and a 
tremulous emotion seemed to break into her voice — she could scarcely 
control it; but Lady Anna was not quick in her perceptions, and she 
noticed nothing peculiar in the sudden feeling that quivered over 
the lovely face. Quite unconscious, she continued, ‘ ‘ 1 have lost 
my way; 1 have a stupid coachman. We are on the wrong side of 
the valley, he tells me, and he positively cannot drive me to the 
Chateau de St. Hilaire.” 

To St. Hilaire! All doubt, if there had been any, of Lady Anna’s 
identity, had vanished now. 

” To St. Hilaire?” the strange lady repeated; and she scanned her 
questioner’s face again, but no gfance of recognition of her own 
identity was visible there. What should she say or do? Lady Anna 
looked pale and worn out, but still perfectly unconscious, as her 
unknown friend repeated, “ To St. Hilaire?” 

“ Yes, yes — to the Chateau de St. Hilaire. 1 intend to visit my 
sister. My carriage is on the eminence there. Will you be so oblig- 
ing as to cause some one to direct us?” 

“ I am very sorry,” said the other, in soft accents; “ but it is a 
long way round from this point by the carriage-entrance to the 
grounds of St. Hilaire. Your coachman has come quite the wrong 
way; but ” — and she laughed a little low, quaint laugh to herself 
at a curious, suddenly recurring memory — “ I have known people 
make that same mistake before.” 

” Dear me, how very tiresome!” exclaimed Lady Anna. 

‘‘But you wish to goto St. Hilaire,” continued the other, “to 
visit the marquise? But, madame, do you know that there is no- 
body at the chateau at present?” 

“ No one at the chateau? What!” exclaimed Lady Anna, re- 
membering, with sudden consternation, that in her hurry and excite- 
ment and impatience she had never announced her visit. “ Is my 
sister — is the Marquise de St. Hilaire away?” 

“Yes, madame, they are all away. They have gone to Biarritz 
for a fortnight or more. Of course, the marquise could not have 
expected you at this period. Surely not, madame; surely not, in 
deed?” 

“No, sure enough, she did uot expect me,” said Lady Annj , 
curtly. ‘ ‘ I did not announce myself, as perhaps 1 should have 
done; but 1 had business 'with my sister,” she added, gloomily. 
“ 1 wished to see her quickly; so, without waiting to write to her, 

1 came off at once.” 


228 


THE SUN-MAID. 


“Ah, what a pity!” said her unknown friend, slowly. “ How- 
grieved the dear marquise will be.” 

“But 1 presume the whole household is not gone,” continued 
Lady Anna, brusquely. “ 1 dare say 1 shall find a servant or two 
to look after me until my sister’s return.” 

“ Surely,” was the reply. “You will be received with all proper 
attention, rest assured, madame. and a telegram shall be sent to the 
marquise, without delay. But still 1 fear, for your comfort and 
requirements, there is scarcely sufficient — the upper servants accom- 
panied the family. The vicomte was married, madame, as of course 
you know, last spring. He has been in Spain with his wife lately, 
and has just come back, and they have gone to meet him; but the 
marquise' will certainly return immediately when she hears that you 
have arrived.” 

“Dear me! dear me!” exclaimed Lady Anna, “ how tiresome it 
all is, to be sure. Here am 1 at the top of the wrong hill, and at the 
end of my long journey, and it seems there will be nobody to meet 
me, after all.” And, overcome with fatigue and disappointment, 
the stately old lady’s composure very nearly gave way. The other 
looked up at her sympatheticall}", and with tender, wondering eyes 
for a moment, and then she said, very low : 

“ And you are the sister of the Marquise de St. Hilaire, madame?’ ' 

“ Yes, 3''es, of course. Violet de St. Hilaire is my onlj^ sister, I 
tell you, and 1 am Ladj^ Anna Erie.” 

The soft, lovely face that she looked upon was bent again as she 
spoke, and there came no answer, while Lady Anna turned away 
and looked petulantly around. She was annoyed beyond endurance 
at last. Suddenly the other said, hesitaticgl^q as if uncertain how 
much it really became her to say : 

“You are the sister of the dear marquise, and 1, madame — 1 think 
1 may say — 1 am her friend. In her absence, can 1 do nothing? 
May I venture, although 1 am a stranger, indeed — ” 

“ A stranger!” exclaimed Lady Anna. “ Pei haps so ten minutei 
ago, my dear; but 1 am so glad to see you, and to hear you speak- 
ing English in this desolate place, that you do not feel in the least a 
stranger to me. Indeed, unless you will guide me, 1 have not a no- 
tion whereto go.” 

The two soft hands were lying on hers again before she had ceased 
to speak. 

“ Will you let me guide you, madame?” came the murmured an- 
swer to her last words, uttered with a curious deferential solicitude. 

“ 'Will you come with me? 1 am sure you need rest and refresh- 
ment. will you come, although 1 am a stranger to you, madame, 
although you know not who 1 may be?” 

“ Whoever you are, my dear,” replied Lady Anna, touched be- 
yond her usual control by the tender, uncommon beauty of the face 
raised with such wistful deference toward her own, “ whoever you 
may be, you are a saint on earth, or you would not be in there," she 
added, nodding with solemn significance toward the door that had 
been closed behind them. 

“ Ah, my poor little patient,” said the othei, gently; “ lhave left 
her doing well. 1 can slip away easily now.” 


THE SUN'-MAID. 229 

"That was a Christian duty, my dear — a Christian duty,” said 
Lady Anna, with stern emphasis again. 

" Ah, no! There is no question of duty. These people are my 
Xiear, familiar friends: naturally they send for me in their troubles, 
as in their simple joys. But now, madame, may 1 not guide you? 
You must be tired indeed. Will you come with me, really? will 
you let me show you the way?” 

" The way to St. Hilaire— I shall indeed be grateful. And see, 
my two servants are just down the road. W e need not trouble you 
far, only to direct the coachman.” 

" But the way to St. Hilaire, dear madame, at least the carriage- 
way, is several miles round the coteaux from where we now are. 
You cannot reach the chateau from this side except on foot through 
the gardens. And you will find nothing ready for your reception at 
the chateau. Will you not adopt another plan? Will you not ac- 
company me where 1 could lead you, and let your servant go round 
with the carriage, and apprise them of your arrival at St. Hilaire?” 

" And meantime I am to go — where?” said Lady Anna. 

"Where 1 will lead you. Will you not accompany me by the 
foot-path to the chateau through the gardens? It is no distance, in- 
deed. May 1 be your guide, dear madame? May 1 not lead you to 
my own little home for refreshment and repose?” 

" I will gladly accompany you, my dear,” said Lady Anna, " for 
I am tired out and weary indeed. I feel as if my journey had been 
a long one; and 1 know not, after all, what 1 may have found at its 
end. ’ ’ 

" Will you come, then?” whispered the other, softly, and she 
drew the old lady’s hand within her arm; and they turned up the 
hill till they reached the carriage, and after a few words of explana- 
tion and direction to the servants, they turned down the hill together 
again, through the wood intc* the hollow, across the rustic bridge 
that spanned the rivulet, then up the bank by the winding path. 

The old lady walked now with tottering and weary footsteps, 
wholly unlike her usual self, and she leaned gladly on the younger 
woman, on whose arm the clinging touch of the frail and trembling 
fingers thrilled with an intensity of feeling she could scarcely sup- 
press. They reached the road that ran round the wall beneath hang- 
ing creepers and roses ; they crossed it and passed through a gate at • 
which Gilbert had lingered often, and for the first time one autumn 
evening now eighteen months ago; and slowly and with halting 
paces. Lady Anna walked on, still letting her young hostess lead , 
and support her— on over the lawn, among the flower- beds, and 
through the lattice window that stood open, as usual revealing the^ 
quaint interior of the room. 

Lady Anna found herself drawn gently across the threshold and 
toward the fireplace, while soft words of welcome fell pleasantly on 

her ears. -r . » ■ 

The room looked pretty and inviting, and Lady Anna, tired out 
beyond all power of astonishment or curiosity, yielded unresistingly 
to the sense of comfort that thus greeted her at the end of her weary 
■way She had gone through so many strange experiences since she 
had left Erie’s Lynn that this little curious episode in her journey 
toward St. Hilaire chimed in naturally with all the rest; and without 


THE SUH-MAID. 


230 

any resistance or question she allowed herself to be quietly divested 
of her traveling-cloak, and to be set down in home-like proximity to 
the chimney-corner; and there she sat, quite exhausteci and silent for 
some minutes, scarcely realizing any peculiarity in her situation or 
noticing her little hostess, who moved about administering to her 
comfort with quiet and noiseless efforts. She left Lady Anna qui- 
etly to recover herself for a few minutes ; then, in low, soothing ac- 
cents, she said: 

“You must be tired, indeed, dear lady, and I know you will like 
a cup of tea. Stay, I will older it for you directly. Rest quietly; 1 
will soon return." 

And with that she was gone, closing the door gently behind her, 
and leaving the room to silence and repose. Repose, indeed. Lady 
Anna found it. 

After the long strain of the railway journey, with sleepless nights 
and weary days, how luxurious seemed the low chair into which she 
had been placed; how refreshing the complete stillness and comfort 
of the room, how pleasant, now the sun had set and the evening 
chills began to fall, was the glow that reached her from the wood 
fire How tired she felt, and how strangely and completely at rest. 

She sunk gradually back into the depths of the chair; the soothing 
influence of stillness fell softly over her spirit; she ceased little by 
little to remember her weariness — her eyelids closed, her hands were 
folded softly and placidly one over the other, and she fell asleep. 


CHAPTER XXX. 
ah! stay. 

Lady Anna must have slept long, for the night had fallen when 
she awoke. She opened her eyes slowly, and, as they lighted on her 
surroundings, she started. For an instant she could not remember 
where she was. She remained quiet, and allowed her gaze to wan- 
der round the room before she roused herself. Perfect stillness 
reigned, save for the soft, crackling sound of the burning wood, and 
the only light was from the fire-flames that danced up bright and 
clear, showing her, as her eyes traveled slowly, what a strange-look- 
ing room it was. 

She had been so tired when she came in, and had entered so hur- 
riedly, and had fallen asleep so immediately she sat down, that she 
had noticed nothing. But now, in the flickering light, the curiously 
lined walls, the jasper vases, the easel with its pictures, and all the 
other costly furnishings of the room met her wondering gaze, and 
all seemed strange to her; and yet not strange! like nothing she had 
ever seen, most certainly; and yet like something of which she had 
read or heard. 

She sat up that she might see better after a while, moving noise- 
lessly and glancing quietly around; and suddenly she perceived her 
unknown hostess just opposite to her, drawn back into the shadow, 
sitting quite silent and still. Lady Anna looked eagerly across and 
watched her for a moment. She could see the large eyes fixed 
dreamily on the flames, and she could detect that they were laden 
with grave expression, and full of some saddening thought— some 
thought that so absorbed the thinker that she remained unconscious 
for several minutes that Lady Anna had awaked from her refreshing 


THE SUiq'-HAID. 


23; 


slumbers, and was gazing with much wonder and compassion into 
her face. For those feelings were stirred within Lady Anna’s heart 
as she watched that fair young countenance, and traced in its touch- 
ing aspect some sad, Ridden story of pain. She looked so lovely 
and so resigned, and yet so intensely sorrowful. 

Suddenly she turned her eyes full, as she supposed, upon her 

her and acTOS^ caught the old lady’s gaze fixed full upon 

ner, ana across me pvpb mpr fnr « in silpnnp 


the younger 

that seemed to aguui^-c uci mwaivAi^, tnovprenmp her 

self-control; and Lady Anna’s full of wondering- 
instinct strove fruitlessly to read the enigma written on tharVA^^ 
face. 

Lady Anna paused, and after a moment the other rose, came over 
to her, and, with a sudden impulse, sunk on her knees by the old 
lady’s side. 

“ You feel rested?” she said. “ You have had a long, quiet sleep, 
madame? Has it done you good?” 

“A great deal of good, my dear,” replied Lady Anna, rousing 
herself with energy. ” I feel quite refreshed — much better.” 

“ 1 am so gla(i— you look better, for when you entered you seemed 
worn out indeed,” conlinued her hostess, softly. & 

“Yes. And, dear me, it seems all so strange! 1 really do not 
know what is to become of me, ’ ’ began Lady Anna again. ‘ ‘ Here 
1 am, and my sister is away, and there is nobody at the chateau; and 



stay, will you not? Y^ou will not refuse to stay and rest with me?” 

“ Refuse? My dear, 1 am sure 1 do not know. I have never trav- 
eled before, anywhere, at any time of my life, you see, and 1 am 
sure I don’t in the least know what to do!” 

“ You will have a cup of tea now% dear madame, that is what you 
will do,” continued the other, rising. “ See — your tea in your En- 
glish fashion, is all ready for you, and later you will go upstairs 
and have a quiet night’s rest. To-morrow will be lime enough to 
trouble yourself with the question of what you will like to do until 
Madame de St. Hilaire returns. To-night, at all events, you will stav 
with me here. Meantime, dear lady, will you drink your^cup of 
tea?” And as she spoke she wheeled a little table with an English 
tea-service, to Lady Anna’s side, and then she filled a cup 
cream and sugar and very fragrant tea. “Is that as you hke it^^^ 
she asked. “ Y"ou see, 1 am very stupid about your English way! 

“ 1 am sure you are very kind to me,” said Lady Anna ex- 
tremely kind,” she continued, as, with much satisfaction and en- 
•joyment, she sipped her tea. “ I am sure I ought to be very grate- 
ful and 1 am. This tea is excellent, my dear, and 1 must confess, 
indeed, that I did not expect to drink it as good as this in France. ^ 

“ But I am not a Frenchwoman, madame, said her hostess, qui- 
etlv' “ nor do I buy my tea in France. This comes to me from a 

longway off; it is sent to me every year.” 

“''You are not a Frenchwoman?” said Lady Anna, with slight 
astonishment, looking suddenly round the room again and back to 


THE SUIf-MAID. 


2^32 

her hostess with rapid glances, as if, now that the fatigue and stupe- 
faction of her senses were passing somewhat away, curiosity as to 
her situation and her unknown entertainer were beginning to assert 
its power. The question, ‘ ‘ Who and what are you, then, my dear? 
rose to her lips instinctively, but it seemed difficult, thus ungarnished 
to put it. She paused, and again looked earnestly at her hostess, 
“ You are not a Frenchwoman, ” she said. * 

thought you were one of my sister a woman. Rus- 

• ^ farher’s native land.” 

^^Lady Anna put down her teacup, and she both 
and stared. A Russian! This graceful woman, with those 
sweet, serious eyes, and soft, caressing manner. She — a Russian ! 
like that other one, “ the Babylonish woman ’’—Lady Anna’s hated 
foe! This young hostess, who had received her with such winning 
courtesy at the end of her wxary journeyings. This woman w^as a 
Russian too! 

Lady Anna was silent with consternation and amazement, and the 
other remained silent also, and looked gravely before her into the fire. 

“A Russian!” murmured Lady Anna, and still her unknown 
friend remained silent, with a curious and irresolute expression in her 
^yes. ” 1 have never known a Russian, but 1 have heard of one;” 
and the old lady paused, as if uncertain what she really wished to 
say; for all the anxiety and serious purport of her journey came 
breaking over her afresh, as she remembered her misery, her bitter 
fears, and her stern anger with her son. ‘‘ 1 have heard,” she began 
again; but before she could continue her sentence, her young host- 
ess suddenly took her two hands between her own, and, bending over 
them until they touched her lips, she said : 

“ My name is Zophee Yariazinka, Lady Anna. Perhaps you have 
heard of me.’' 

The strange-looking, fire-lit room seemed to sink away before Lady 
Anna's eyes as the words reached her ; she grew faint and giddy, and 
only a low exclamation broke at first from her lips. She started back, 
as if she would have pushed Madame Zophee from her, in ner sudden 
frenzy of astonishment and dismay. She strove to draw her hands 
aw’^ay, but she could not, for the warm touch of the trembling lips 
was resting upon them, and they were still held fast in Madame 
Zophee’s clasp. 

” Forgive me, forgive me, ” she continued, “ lamZophee Variazin- 
ka indeed.” 

“ Impossible!” was the one word that Lady Anna found at last to 
utter, and she said it again and again as if to assure herself: while 
Zophee still knelt beside her, with the fire-light falling upon her 
dusky, bending head, and on the outline of her graceful form. ‘ ‘ Im- 
possible!” Lady Anna said once more, as speech came back to her 
suddenly and poured vehemently from her lips. ” You, the 
W’oman of Babylon — you, the outlandish woman who has stolen away 
my son ! Nonsense, nonsense, my dear, it is quite impossible. Why, 
you do not know what kind of person she is!” 

Then Zophee looked up, and she shook her head, and her lips parted 
and quivered with a wistful smile at the old lady’s obstinacy and de- 
termination 


THE SUN-MATD. 


233 

“lam she, indeed,” she murmured. “ I am Zophee Yariazinka; 
and oh, Lady Anna,” she added, with sudden passion and intense 
pathos in ner tones, “ do not think of me— what matter who or what 
1 am, but oh, for pity’f, sake! for the love of Heaven! tell me some- 
thing of Gilbert, Give me tidings at long last of your son !” 

Lady Anna seemed scarcely to hear. She loosened her hands from 
the eager clasp in which they had been inclosed; she put them upon 
Madame Zophee’s shoulder, and turned her face with gentle force 
toward the fire; and she looked long, with mute astonishment, upon 
the lovely, delicate features, and into the larji-e, deep, scintillating 
eyes. She let her gaze rest on that expression— so soft and earnest, 
so pure and self-contained— and a curious tremor shook her own 
stern lip. 

She thought of Gilbert as she realized that this was the face he had 
loved and remembered ; and then, just as out on the coteaux summits 
she had caught, for the first time, the spirit of his enthusiasm for the 
mountain glories, so she seemed to understand all his love and hig 
fidelity to Zophee Yariazinka now. 

At length, very slowly, and with curious gi*avity, she said, “ Are 
you indeed speaking the truth?” 

“ 1 am Zophee Yariazinka,” said the other, softly; “ and you are 
— ah! I have heard of you ohen. What strange leading of destiny 
has brought you here?” 

“ 1 have come,” said Lady Anna, “ to look for him— you know 
whom 1 mean. If you are she, I need not tell you — you must know. 
And ah! tell me — tell me quickly, for I am his mother, and nearl}’’ 
broken-hearted with the weariness and the waiting. Oh, Zophee 
Yariazinka, what have you done with my son?” 

“ Your sou— Gilbert? Madame, what have 1 done? Indeed, in- 
deed, 1 know too well what 1 have done. And if suffering and bit- 
ter tears can expiate, 1 may surely dare to pray even for foigiveness 
from you.” 

“ But my boy, Gilbert, my only son, where is he? That is what I 
come all this w-ay to know, that is what 1 would ask of ni}’’ sister — 
of you — of all of you wdio have known him— who have had him so 
long among you here. What have you done with him? Where is 
my son?” 

“ Where is he, madame? What do you say? Where is he? Be- 
fore God, 1 know not. Ah, Heaven! what is it? What have you 
to tell me of him? Where is he, madame? Ah, Heaven! He has 
not left you? He is not gone?” 

“ What do you know of him?” said Lady Anna, with a sudden 
sternness. 

“1? 1 know nothing, dear lady; 1 know nothing at all. Oh, 
God! what have you to tell me? You seek him?” 

“You know nothing?” 

“ Nothing — nothing. Since last year in spring-time 1 have seen 
nothing of him. 1 have heard of him but once; and, dear madame, 
in mv desolate and w^eary heart, believe me, I hoped, as I prayed, 
that he had forgotten me— that he was happy, as if he had never 
known me. But is it not so? Ah, tell me of him! Is he not at 
Erie’s Lynn now?” 

“ You know nothing?” repeated Lady Anna again, as if only that 


THE SUX-MAID. 


234 

one central fact had reached her ears. “And my sister— ah! but 
surely she must know. ’ ’ 

“ She — the marquise? No; that, too, mus<- be impossible,” said 
Madame Zophee. “ She would have told me. Slie knows nothing. 
1 am confident he has not been heard of here. ’ 

“ He has not been here? He has not been heard of? He did not 
come to you?” repeated Lady Anna again. 

“ To me? Ah, dear madame, no; not since that bitter morning, 
that bright spring day, when he went away from me down into the 
wood below the hill. 1 have never seen him since; he did not come 
again. 1 have borne my sorrow and my broken heart alone. Ah, 
Lady Anna! pity me, and forgive me, and tell me more; speak of 
jhim to me. Gilbert, Gilbert — he has not left yoUy surely? Why, 
where has he gone?” 

“ God knows!” said Lady Anna, solemnly, “ for 1 do not. I have 
not seen him, no more than you have; and when I last heard of him 
was five long months ago.” 

“ And this,” cried Madame Zophee, bitterly, “ is my doing still! 
Ah, madame, forgive me. If 1 could only have borne it all; if 1 
could have shielded this sorrow with my life from him, from you! 
Ah! Gilbert, where are you? Why have 3 ’'ou done this? Why do 
you crush me with anguish? Ah! Gilbert, and you promised me! 
Gilbert, my love! my love!” 

And Zophee, almost forgetful of Lady Anna, bent her head, cov- 
ered her face with her hands, and sobbed and firembled violentlj’', all 
her love and suffering suddenly unsealed within her, and breaking 
fiercely over the limits of her self-control. 

“ And did you, then, so love my son?” said Lady Anna, laying 
her hand on the bending shoulders and speaking soft and low. 

“ Ah! love him! 1 was lonely,” Madame Zophee said; “ and like 
summer he came to me — like a dream of youth. Love him ! It had 
been wintery darkness so long, so long. And now — I drove him 
from me; he went his way; and 1 — since that bitter morning my 
heart has been very desolate and sad. Ah 1 madame, you know, j'ou 
know, what it must be. He is your son!” 

“ My only son,” murmured Lady Anna; “and you are Zophee 
Variazinka, of whom he spoke to me?” 

“lam Zophee Variazinka; and, dear madame, now you know, 
you will not leave me? You will not hate me, and fly from my 
lonely, desolate home. Nay, stay with me; will you not? Oh, 
stay!” 

“Yes,” said Lady Anna, softlj*, “ 1 will remain. I am tired, my 
dear, and much astonished, for 1 see I have been under a mistake. 
I thought to find my son here, and 1 do not find him, and so 1 am 
very heart-sick and sad. But I will remain, for it is not in vain 
that I have traveled, even tlioimh my boy is unfound; for at my 
journey’s end 1 find what 1 little looked for, since, my dear, I have 
discovered you.” 

“ And you will stay! Ah, joy! and I may shower my love for 
him in tender care of you — you who are brought to me, surely, that 
1 may keep you safe for him. My Gilbert’s mother! Ah, joy! you 
will stay?” 

“ 1 will stay,” said Lady Anna, gently, and she paused a moment 


THE SUH-MAID. 


235 


once more; then she laid her hand on Madame Zophee’s shoulder 
again. “ And did you so love my boy?” she said. ” You loved 
him, and yet you broke his heart, and drove him quite away. ’ ’ 

Drove him away!” exclaimed Madame Zophee, earnestly, look- 
ing with amazement into Lady Anna’s face. “Yes, drove him 
away — as far as possible away. Yes, though it wrung my soul to 
part with him. Of course, 1 drove him away.” 

“And why?” said Lady Anna, gently; “if you love him? 
Why?” 

“ If 1 love him? God help me — if 1 love him? Did he ever tell 
you? Do you think that anything but duty, and the holiest sense 
of what is right and wrong, would have forced me to drive him from 
me — Gilbert, whom 1 loved with my whole heart? Did he never tell 
you?” she said. 

“He told me nothing, save that you would not marry him,” 
sighed Lady Anna. “ He said all the reasons, all the story, was not 
Ids secret, but yours.” 

“ Ah, noble!” murmured AJadame Zophee. “ He never told you, 
and yet you were his mother, and he your only child, and driven 
from you, and by me! Ah, madame, surely the revelation is due to 
you also, even as it was to him — the key to my secrets, the unveiling 
of all my life — 1 would tell you also, even as 1 told him; for I 
would have you forgive me, even as he forgave. Ah, madame, will 
you listen as he listened? Will you let me tell you all? But,” she 
added, suddenly, for the recollection came to her of all Lady Anna 
had that day gone through, ‘ ‘ the story is a long one, and jmu, dear 
madame, are weary with your journey, and need rest. To-morrow, 
when you are refreshed and strengthened, we will talk together, and 
you shall hear my tale. ’ ’ 

“ Yes,” said Lady Anna, gently. “ 1 think 1 must go now to 
rest; the day has been a long one, and somehow 1 do seem to have 
traveled far.” 

“Then let me lead you,” murmured Zophee again. “Come, 
lean on my arm once more. ” 

And Lady Anna rose and moved across the room, leaning heavily 
on Zophee as she walked. She seemed weary indeed in frame and 
spirit, and very unlike herself. The excitement and fatigue and 
surprise which had come upon her, crowded into the experience of a 
day, were all too much for her. So many things came rushing into 
her mind — intensity of astonishment, and the sudden revulsion of 
some of her strongest feelings — she felt quite overpow'cred. She 
only realized now how glad she was to lean on Zophee, to meet her 
kind, soft glance, to feel the gentle touch of the caressing lingers, 
and to rest her gaze on the sensitive, mobile face. 

“ My dear,” Lady Anna said, pausing as they reached the door, 
“ it is a strange Providence that has brought me here to fall dowm, 
as it were, travel- worn and weary, on the Hireshold of your house; 
and I believe in the leading of Providence,” she added, sternly; 
“ and 1 do not think that I was brought for naught. 1 will go with 
you now, and, as you say, rest mind and body, and to-morrow 1 will 
hear your tale— hear you gladl}^— for my heart is touched when you 
speak the name of my boy Gilbert in your sad, tender way. And, 
my dear, I think of the cottage on the hill up there, where first I 


THE SUH-MAED. 


^36 

saw you to-day; and as for * the Babylonish woman ’ — that ‘ out- 
landish person,’ you know, for whom my son was foolishly pining 
all the long summer through — you are not like her in the very least, 
my dear, and it is all a huge mistake, every bit of it; for you are 
not she at all. ’ ’ 

When, two days later, in answer to an astounding telegram, the 
Marquise de St. Hilaire arrived hurriedly at home, she had to walk 
down through the chateau grounds to the chalet before she found 
her sister. She came upon her, sitting in Madame Zophee’s garden, 
more happy and placid than she had been for many a day, though 
Gilbert was still not there. 

And if Gilbert himself, indeed, could have looked in upon them 
at the chateau or in the chalet any day during the few following 
weeks, /le would have been truly surprised. If he could have seen 
his mother and her renegade sister together, and united in sym- 
pathy by their great concern for his absence* and their ceaseless 
efforts to find some clew to his whereabouts; and, still more, if he 
could have seen his mother and Zophee Variazinka passing hours in 
earnest converse day by day — seen them as they were — closely bound 
by a love for Mm, of which none could share the depth and inten- 
sity — if he could have realized all this, he would have been speech- 
less from amazement, and full of joy. 

But he could not see it, and he knew nothing; for all this time, 
while spring crept softly over the valleys and the coteaux, Gilbert 
was still far away. 

CHAPTER XXXI. 

GILBERT AFAR. 

The day after Gilbert wrote that last letter to his mother fro m 
Berlin he started on a railway journey, so long, so wearisome, and 
in many ways so difficult, that it was small wonder he delayed letter- 
writing till he reached its end. The ticket he took at the Berlin 
station was for Konigsberg, and from thence he crossed the Russian 
frontier, and proceeded onward, over leagues of country, and 
througli vast forest lands — onward until the wide extent of the Rus- 
sian-European empire lay between him and the western frontier, at 
Konigsberg. 

It was an enterprising journey, and it was undertaken in spite of 
much opposition from his friends. 

Gilbert had made sundry friends since he had started from Erie’s 
Lynn. He had found out, as he wrote to his mother, his old rela- 
tive, the quondam embassador to Russia, and from him he had ob- 
tained introductions to every sort of person at all likely to assist him 
in the wild project he had in view. The old embassador had been 
pleased with this ardent and impetuous young relation of his, had 
encouraged his idea of travel, and had acceded willingly to his re- 
quest for presentation to Russian circles of power. But he had ridi- 
culed, nevertheless, the programme of the journey, which Gilbert, 
by help of maps and books of travel, had laid down for himself', 
laughing at the idea of his going to “ Siberia,” as a thing absurd — 
” a mere waste of time,” the old diplomate had said. ” Go to St. 
Petersburg, my boy, and 1 will gladly present you to the chief stars 
of society there; you will enjoy yourself, have a capital winter, and 


THE SUN-MAID. 


237 

see a great deal of life— charming society, I assure you, no bettet to 
be met with, in its own particular way.” 

But this advice had made no impression upon Gilbert, though he 
took all the introductions he could get. And with these he started, 
lingering only in Paris, and again in Berlin, to see certain great 
personages to whom the old embassador had sent him for further in- 
troductions that might help him on his way. 

He traveled right across Russia, through forest and flood, by Mos- 
cow, Nijni, and Kasan. On he went until the slopes of the steppes 
lay outstretched before him, until the lofty summits of the Ural 
range rose mighty on the horizon, and he had reached the far-dis- 
tant Perm. Here the railway ended; that iron road was still un- 
finished -which has since carried day into the darkness of Siberia, and 
drawn Tomsk, and even distant Irkutsk, into the widening light. 
The trains at that date could carry Gilbert no further, but a great 
deal further he was resolved to go. 

It was a strange, wild idea that had entered his mind, seizing vio- 
lent and unconquerable hold on him, in the latter days of his deso- 
late misery at Erie’s Lynn — the idea that he could stay quiet in mute 
and unresisting suffering no longer, but that he would set off, and 
neither halt in his journey nor relax in his effort until, traversing 
snow and forest mountain ana sea and land, piercing the darkness 
of the convict mines, penetrating the fastnesses of the Russian pris- 
ons, scouring the wild countr}'- of the Kalmuck or Kirghez-Cossack, 
going north to the icy ranges of the Artie Circle, or south to where 
the steppes of Trans-Caucasia are washed by the Caspian Sea, going 
eastward toward the sunrise, beyond the silver mines of Irkutsk, or 
the blue lake Baikal— he was resolved to wander, to search, and all 
untiringly to travel here and there, until he had found Mettrai 
Vododski — found him, alive or dead. 

The notion had seized Gilbert’s mind that, with energj’- and enter- 
prise, Mettrai must indeed be found; and that -when found, he might 
be forced, somehow, to give up that unworthily won right of his 
over Zophee Variazinka’s life. He must be found, so Gilbert felt 
certain. 

Full of the strength of his young manhood, rich in thejaith and 
the bright hopes of youtli, Gilbert had started, resolution in his 
mind, one desire ruling omnipotent in his eager heart, and the spirit 
of enterprise burning high within him. 

The introductions he had chiefly coveted, and which he now most 
prized, were those which his powerful Berlin and Paris friends had 
given him lightly and with incredulous smiles, doubting much that 
he would ever use them, and laying real stress only on those which 
would insure him welcome in the charmed and close-shut circles of 
St. Petersburg fashion and rank. He had accepted all, but those 
he really treasured, and of which he scanned eagerly the directions 
again and again, were to the chief officials of such places as Tobolsk, 
Ekaterinburg, and Troitsk — towns which he knew he could never 
penetrate without such credentials. He had letters to the chiefs of 
the department at all these places, and to the head of the whole 
Siberian Commission at its center in Perm. “ An adventurous young ' 
Englishman,” his friends thought him as they gave their introduc- 
tions; but they doubted his energy holding out beyond Novgorod, 


THE SUH-MAID. 


238 

and they strongly advised him to test the fascinations ot St. Peters- 
burg instead. 

But Gilbert was determined, and, quite dauntless, against all per- 
suasion he set forth. At Perm he procured an interpreter, one of the 
only three men who, in these remote regions, understood both 
“Little Russian” and French; and, thus accompanied, he pro- 
ceeded onward again. In a teljega, with trusty moujik driver and 
four fast-fleeting steeds, he started, and soon the long, monotonous 
traveling of the wind-swept steppes became familiar to him. 
Through days that seemed endless and innumerable, he skimnied 
across the snow-clad plains. He drove through the drows3" air of 
wonderful moonlit nights, while deep silence reigned for miles 
round him, and the horses’ hoofs sunk noiselessly into the snow. 

He slept at the solitary stations. He grew at home in the corners 
by the house-stove, familiar with the kindly peasants, fond of their 
black bread and chai. The “ Lozhadjei gatovi ” from his moujik, 
as he started of a morning, and the unfailing “ Ssovssem ” uttered 
by the postmaster of the house, as the horses sprung forward from 
the door, became as familiar in his ears as their equivalents ot 
“ Horses ready,” and “ All right, sir.” with which the old groom 
used to start him in his phaeton at Erie’s Lj nn. 

It was lonely work, and it was sometimes wearisome. A phys- 
ically weaker man would have found the fatigue and exposure un- 
bearable, and, long before the journey was half over, would have- 
turned back or broken down; but Gilbert was strong in spirit, 
sound in constitution, bright and courageous, of an active and ener- 
getic temperament, and of a nature ready to endure; and from first 
to last he enjo3'^ed it. The jolting of the teljega over the rough 
frozen snow, the solitude and the'" consequent silence, the spare, 
frugal diet, the poor resting-place bj’’ the chimney-corner — all 
braced and invigorated rather than exhausted him; for the pure, 
keen air, blowing day after day fresh over the snow, seemed to 
affect him with a wonderful power at once nerve-stirring and exhil- 
arating. Then he never tired of the wondrous scenes that lay 
around ; of the loveliness of that crystal expanse of snow, or of the 
changeful effects of light and darkness, of dawn and evening, of 
sunrise and sunset, as all followed each other in the rapid and cease- 
less transitions of the passing day. 

He sped along for many of these days. He slept many a night 
beneath the welcome shelter of the rough log -houses of the steppes; 
he learned to drink kvas and vodka, as well as the golden chai. He 
picked up numberless queer-sounding sentences of the peasant Rus- 
sian, and by help of signs and gesticulation came to understand 
them, too. And they said much that was worth the hearing, these 
rough and kindly peasants, as they Sat by the stove-side in the lonely 
post-house, and told each other strange tales, in awe-struck and 
suppressed voices, of the wild, weird doings of the “ Chert,” the 
black one, or of the “ Domovoy,” the unseen spirits of the hearth. 
Gilbert had many strange experiences by the way, and he kept care- 
ful note of all. He means one day to give his reading friends the full 
benefit of what he experienced and saw. And this being certainly 
his intention, we will only forestall his publication by describing 


THE SUH-MAID. 239 

one among his many days of adventure ; of just one we must give 
the details here. 

The scene had often changed, and he had traversed the mighty 
range that bars the frontier of Europe. He had halted at many 
places, encountering all official barriers with the powerful letters he 
bore; he had reached the mines, and traveled in a rough-built 
troika from one to the other; he had scanned the convict and the 
peasant crowds ; he had questioned and searched, and interviewed 
oflScial after official, chief after chief; he had gathered knowledge 
and gained experience; he had tasted with keen zest the fascination 
of enterprise; and he had arrived, gradually and by slow and very 
reluctant degrees, at the realization that the object, the individual, 
he was in search of was not to be found at all. 

Indeed, he was by no means the only one in search of Mettrai 
Vododski; so he learned from a few confidential interviews with 
some of the convict commissary chiefs. They treated him with con- 
fidence, for to such his letters, and the authorities from which they 
came, seemed to entitle him. He was described therein as a distin- 
guished personage traveling for purposes that had no reference to 
political affairs; and the importance of his purpose seemed to the 
officials with whom he came in contact, to be suflBciently indicated 
by the signatures inscribed upon his introductions. They proved 
powerful enough to insure him all he needed in the way of admit- 
tance, information, and help. 

Thus he saw much of many things not often seen by travelers in 
these distant lands, but of JMettrai Vododski he found no trace w^hat- 
ever; and for a long time he could hear even nothing at all. 

What he did hear, at long last, was not encouraging. It was at 
Orenzitz, near the European frontier, in a chance conversation, that 
he at length found some on who would confess, in deep confidence, 
a knowledge of Vododski’s name. This man was the commissioner 
of the department there. He spoke French, and he talked long with 
Gilbert, and he finally confessed that he had known Mettrai in bis 
convict position by his number, as all there knew him, and also pri- 
vately by that family name in which Gilbert inquired. 

What this man knew, he told him. He spoke of the first term of 
Mettrai’s exile in the ^arb of a convict, and in the deep degradation 
of the mine, of his rajnd promotion, of his restoration to comparative 
liberty, and of his immediate escape. Further, he told of Mettrai’s 
recapture, of the quick trial and condemnation that followed, which 
with any other political prisoner would have resulted in his death. 
With any other, but — he had been strangely dealt with throughout, 
this man Vododski; he had been watched and guarded through 
some powerful, silent agency working from some lofty source. And 
the same arm was stretched out in that hour of extremity : an order 
had filtered through the ranks of official command, and he was 
saved. They spared him, and only last spring he had eluded them 
again. jSTow they, as well as Gilbert, were in eager search of him, and 
the slightest trace would be followed by a crowd of vigilant eyes. 

For he had scarcely escaped a second time, when a secret con- 
spiracy exploded that was ripe, deep-laid, and wanted only courage 
for its success; and Mettrai Vododski had been the founder and chief 
actuator of this ; but he saw another opening suddenly, and he es- 


THE SUN-MAID. 


240 

caped instead. He saved himself, but his name was branded. The 
outposts on every side were on the watch for him; a higli price was 
set upon hjs capture; and if he were taken, no intervention from any 
sort of authority could prevail to save him now. But where was 
he? — probably dead. 

All this Gilbert heard, coming at length quite unawares on the 
lost traces of the man he sought; and, having heard this much, there 
was little more than he could do. For just then, in its full violence, 
the Siberian winter came down upon them-, and, snow-locked in 
that wild, distant land, far beyond the reach of letter-sending, he 
had to linger and to wait. It was not till the first breath of the still 
distant promise of the spring seemed to make the transit possible 
again, that we find him one day, having w^andered as weather per- 
mitted, and as the advice of Jiis official friends allowed him to go, 
far south from the course of his first teljega journey, and attempt- 
ing the homeward passage by the Cis- Caucasian steppes. 


CHAPTER XXXll. 

GOING HOME. 

Gilbert was still traveling the wide stretch of that snowy land 
at the very time when Lady Anna Erie reached the coteaux of the 
Pyrenees, and found the smiles of spring chasing away the gloom 
of winter around Madame Zophee’s house. When Gilbert jour- 
neyed, all was wintery still. The Caucasus — which in summer are 
verdant and flower-studded, with a luxury of Southern beauty that 
rivals even the coteaux of the Pyrenees — were still covered, as he 
traversed their valleys and lower spurs, with their dazzling garments 
of snow. The hoofs of his four swift steeds still sunk noiseless 
upon the soft track, his moujik still wore his sheep-skin wrapped 
close round his chin. 

At the very time when Lady Anna reached the shelter of Madame 
Zophee’s clialet, Gilbert M^as thus traveling. And at the hour when 
his mother and his sw^eet friend — the two" people in the wide world 
that loved him best — were meeting, and striking for the first time 
the chords of their sympathy, uniting their hearts strongly together 
by the oneness of their anxiety and earnest love for him, he w^as pur- 
suing his monotonous journey over steppes and plains : and this par- 
ticular day he was making for Georgievsk, a town of Cis-Caucasia, 
as rapidl}’’ as the snow and the mists of the evening allowed his eager 
horses to speed. His moujik stood beside him; his interpreter, 
silent and uncommunicative, was by his side; and wrapped in his 
huge muffled furs, almost hidden from head to foot, Gilbert sat, 
buried in profound reverie and deep, concentrated thought. 

He was speeding homeward now ; these long sleigh-drives would 
soon be over for him. He had made his journey rapidly, restlessly, 
and impetuously, from its very commencement rmtil now, and he 
had seen a great deal, and encountered a great deal, and by dint of 
all he had felt and suffered and experienced, he was, moreover, 
much changed— more, indeed, than he knew or suspected. 

As he sat now still and silent, as the sleigh skimmed noiselessly 
over the snow, many things were recurring to his mind. He looked 
backward over his journey and its vicissitudes; he looked forward 
toward the realization that he was going home, and going home 


THE SUH-MAID. 


241 


quite unsuccessful, having failed, as they warned him he would 
fail, having endured all the toil and fatigue, encountered all the 
perils and difficulties of his adventurous journey, without the slight- 
est result. He had exhausted his energies ; he had accomplished all 
that was possible; he had left no effort untried; and he had been 
quite unsuccessful. 

Now he was going home to resign himself, understanding better 
than he did a year ago what life really demands of a man when bit- 
terness is mingled in his cup of fortune, and he is called upon to be 
resigned. As his sledge skimmed over the snow, and he sat there in 
a silence that was really solitude, many clear pictures rose before him 
of his life, as he was now going back to find it, still without Zophee 
Variazinka, as he well knew. He had gained nothing, carried no 
single point, with all his efforts, that would draw her even one step 
nearer to himself. Life must be lived out without her, for he had 
failed to break down the barrier that lay between them; life must 
be lived out, in the gray wintery light of duty, through all the dim 
years to come. Mettrai Vododski still lived, as far as he knew — 
still stood between happiness and him. 

Gilbert was going home, however ; and all that day, over the vast, 
immeasurable snows, the sleigh had carried him far onward on his 
homeward course; and he had sat and thought there, suffering, and 
studying to conquer suffering, facing life, and steadily learning, in 
his strong heart, to resign. 

It had been, like many, a brilliant day; the fierce bright sun of 
Caucasia had glittered since the break of morning over the plains. 
But it was still a wintery day, and evening came falling early, and as 
the sledge sped along, still far from its night’s destination, clouds 
were gathering on the horizon, and curious gusts of wind came 
sweeping over the steppes. The show, too, was drifting into bil- 
lows that, as twilight approached, rose and fell, and undulated as if 
the glistening expanse were a heaving sea; and, far away across the 
eastern horizon, where the wind swept angrily in quick and succes- 
sive whirls, there was especially a great gathering of this drifting 
snow which suddenly caught Gilbert’s eye, as something quite curi- 
ous and new to him. He sal up to watch it, just as the moujik 
driver uttered an exclamation, struck his horses with violence, gath- 
ered his reins vigorously together, and sent them plunging rapidly 
on. 

“Ah-ha!” he exclaimed, “ glory be to the God of the elements! 
there is a storm coming up on the horizon to the east.” 

” Get on!” cried Dimitri, the interpreter, loudly roused, in an in- 
stant, to a sense of their position, and the danger it implied; for a 
storm in the steppes is a terrible thing, and the drifting snow is a 
more fearful sight to the moujik than the fiercest Atlantic billow to 
the helmsman of a ship at sea. 

On they swept with the speed of the lightning-flash; and eagerly 
they watched the far-away gathering in the eastern horizon, the 
clouds that rolled ominously, and the storm that came drifting 
steadily across their way — on they sped. . , 

“We shall not reach Georgievsk lo-mght alive 1 cried the 
moujik, at last. “On, my little darlings, on! Gee-up! away!” 
And with his long lash he cracked again and again high over the 


THE SUN'-MAID. 


242 

heads of his fiery horses, shouting to them, both in threatening and 
endearing epithets, and jingling his rein-bells violently to encourage 
them along. “But it is of no use,” he muttered, “the storm is 
coming. Georgievsk is three versts from here. We are undone- 
undone!” 

“ God have mercy upon us!” muttered Dimitri, with stolid sol- 
emnity, as he shivered, and wrapped himself a little closer in his 
furs. 

“But it is glorious— wonderful!” exclaimed Gilbert, as, with 
beating heart and crimson cheek, he sat up, forgetful of the danger, 
and' watched the distant splendor of the gathering storm. “It is 
magnificent!” he exclaimed; and then he drew his spy -glass out, 
and watched and watched as the sledge sped on. 

The clouds deepened and lowered ; the snow seemed to rock and 
heave; and far over the level plains came again and again upon their 
ears the low, growling echoes of the whirlwind, mingling with the 
yelp and bay of affrighted wolves and foxes, as they fled before the 
gathering storm. 

Gilbert watched -with suppressed exclamations, and with beating 
heart, and the horses plunged and galloped, and the sledge sped on. 

Suddenly, “ What is that?” he cried; and he lowered his glass to 
point eagerly over the plain toward the horizon, where the object 
that caught his attention was visible against the storm-cloud even to 
the unaided eye. Both the moujik and Dimitri turned as he direct- 
ed, and both exclaimed as they gazed. For against the darkening 
sky, between them and the gathering drift, they could see an object, 
a dark, curious, swiftly moving mass, too tall and high against the 
sky to be a wolf -pack, too ciosely knit to be a caravansary of a 
sl^ge-train. They were a band of mounted horses, rattling as fast 
as spur and urging voice could send them across between their sledge 
and the horizon of the sky. 

“ Bogu!” exclaimed the moujik and Dimitri both at once; “ they 
are soldiers ; they are an outpost band, scouring the country, seeking 
for fugitives, and, yah! they are flying, as we are, like antelopes be- 
fore the storm. Go on, my darling, my little beauties, go on! Save 
your master — save us, my children, if you can !” 

And with this he drove on his plunging horses again. 

Gilbert still watched the small, dark baud of riders — a black, swift- 
moving mass they looked, weird and strange, flying like wild, mad 
spirits of the tempest-like chests, as Dimitii exclaimed, meaning 
storm-devils, or black spirits of the mists. 

“Ha! they are not cherts,” the moujik said; “ they are Cossacks 
for the Georgievsk stanzia, soldiers of the Bussian commissioner of 
the mines. 1 know them,” he said, “ the swift sweep of the little 
beauties, the good little mountain steeds. But mine can match 
them! Go on, my darlings! go on!” 

Silently then they sped, and nearer came the gathering storm, and 
Gilbert vratched still intently, and with a stem giavity coming over 
his face. He began to realize the danger, for the billowy drift came 
nearer, and the ominous growl of the whirlwind came straighter 
every moment across their track. The little steeds plungtd gallantly 
forward, plowing the snow-drift and struggling bravely with the 
sweeping winds, and the moujik shouted and cried to them in en- 


THE SUH-MAIE. 


243 


couragement ; but still the danger rolled terribly near. Strange 
thoughts came rushing then swiftly through Gilbert’s mind, of 
home, of his mother, of Zophee ! Was a wintery grave in the snowy 
steppes of Cis-Caucasia to be the end, then, of the adventurous bat- 
tle he had fought to win her for himself— the end of their short, 
bright romance, and the end of his strong young life just as he had 
felt it begun ? The end — the end — it seemed to sweep wonderfully 
near; for Death was the message written upon that gathering snow- 
cloud drifting toward them on the wings of the whirling wind. 
Death, and a snowy grave, unknown and undiscovered, and here, 
at least, unmourned. 

Still, “ it Was splendid;” and that was the last thought of w^hich 
he was clearly conscious at the time. Then he seemed suddenly 
blinded ; there was a deafening whirl in his ears, a sense something 
chill, cloudy, dense, and impenetrable, that drifted against them 
with fearful violence. The sledge rocked and halted for an instant, 
then once more their brave little team plunged gallantly on. Gilbert 
heard the moujik’s voice shouting above the tempest; then again 
he seemed deaf and blind. He bent his head; the horses were still 
plowing the snow-drift, and fighting with dauntless intrepidity 
through the storm. 

A stuiined sensation came over Gilbert ; he felt faint and stupefied 
bj^ the violence of the sweeping drift; he bent his head; death every 
moment felt inevitable; he sat still and calm; he never knew if the 
time it lasted had been short or long! But suddenly the moujik’s 
voice again rose aloud above the storm, and, through the stupefying 
noise and confusion, Gilbert caught the meaning of his Russian 
words. 

“ Slava Bogu! a gelinka! a little village, praise God! It is Alex- 
androvsk, my beauties! Speed on, speed on!” 

And then again the crack of the long whip came, the sledge rocked 
and tottered; once more their brave Cossack horses plunged and 
plowed valiantly through the storm. It seemed to clear then for a 
moment; lights flashed over the snow-drift, and dazzled, with their 
vivid reflection, Gilbert’s blinded eyes. Then the moujik shouted 
again. “ Slava Bogu!” rose once more above the storm; and, with 
jingling bells and cracking whip and loud, glad cries, they swept 
suddenly round the corner of a half- buried post-house, and their 
gallant little horses brought them whirling to the door. 

It was thrown open instantly. The lights gleamed out upon the 
snow. Rough, kind faces, radiant with hospitality, appeared wuthin. 
They were saved — miracle of miracles, indeed, as the peasants 
shouted around them — they had come through a snow-drift, and 
were saved. 

They entered the humble post-house, the gleaming light of the oil- 
lamps dazzling their snow-blinded eyes; they came in, and Gilbert 
was soon set down by the warm stove-corner, as ever a welcome and 
honored guest. 

The stanzia was like many others he had visited in the course of 
his long journeyings. It was a rough little place; the principal 
room where they sat together was furnished much as usual— with a 
stove, a few wooden chairs, a rough settle near the chimney-corner, 
a table, some kvass and vodka fl^asks, and a samovar. ' There was. 


244 


THE SUJSr-MAID. 


a large iron lamp and a small oil one, which last burned day and 
night in its sacred corner before the family saint. The samovar was 
soon hot and ready; and wonderfully consoling, after their wild 
drive, were long, deep draughts of the golden chai; and refreshed 
by this, and divested of his heavy wrappings, Gilbert sat then, as 
he had sat many evenings, watching the quaint, domestic scene 
around him, and thinking back over the stirring and uncommon ad- 
venture of the day. 

As he sat there now, without fur cloak or covering, the external 
changes were visible that had come over him in these months of 
travel. They accorded justly with the mental and spiritual altera- 
tions that had taken place in his character and line of tliought, and 
they were quite as remarkable; indeed, his old friends might 
scarcely have recognized him at this time, for he was greatly 
changed. He was haggard and worn by travel and exposure, and 
he was sobered and manlier in aspect and mien; a brown beard 
hung low over his chest, and his mustache had grown rough and 
shaggy. He had quite lost his ceaseless, rippling flow of talk, and 
the old smile on his lips and the sweet shimmer in his eyes had be- 
come rare. 

It was impossible to see him just then, and not mourn and miss 
the brightness, because, alas! its external absence was but an evident 
sign that it was gone also from the heart and spirit, and that all was 
gray shadow wdthin. 

By the warm stove of the little post-house he sat late that night, 
changing words, short but hearty, with the station-keeper, with the 
moujik and Dimitri, as they grouped round the center-table at a re- 
spectful distance, cheering their frightened souls with snacks of 
vodka and draughts of kvass. And he watched, amused too for a 
long while, the good wife of the stanzia man, as she sat over against 
him, nursing her Nadine, her “ inka,” as she called it, a fat, stolid 
maiden of tender years. He had a few pleasant words, in his broken 
Russian, ready for them all. 

The storm soon swept on far from them in the post-house, away 
over the distant steppes ; and it was still and noiseless again amidst the 
snow without, and very warm and comfortable within. Gilbert sat 
on, and by and by they all left him, for the wooden settle by the 
stove-side was for his use, as the distinguished guest. Dimitri 
wrapped himself in his fur, and lay down across the threshold of the 
door-way that led into the inner and family sleeping-room; the 
moujik went off to rest in the straw by “ his children, his angels,” 
as he called his four little gallant steeds; and the lady of the mansion 
retired with her inka into the room behind. The host was the last 
to leave Gilbert; for before he went to his slumbers he had a sacred 
office to perform. He was a good moujik, with a warm heart, in 
which strong superstition and spontaneous kindliness were curi- 
ously blended with a strange religious creed that influenced every 
action of his life. He feared Bogu and the Chert; that is, God a 
good deal, and very much the devil ; he believed the first-named, 
the great Deity, reigned in the clouds, thundered in the tempest, 
and lived beneficent in the spiritual flame that burned un- 
dying before the Riza in each peasant house. Dignity, light, com- 
posure, and beneficence, he felt silently to be Bogu; and Chert, 


THE SUH-MAID. 


245 


the hlack one, was all that was most contrary to this. He ttelt Chert 
to be restless, full of movement as full of mischief, haunting the 
midnight, rushing over the house-tops in the angry winds ; he felt 
him vicious and unsatisfied, grasping and ready to take, and, above 
all, hungry— a being to be propitiated with gifts of black bread or a 
flask of kvass. And so. before the moujik postman laid him down 
to rest, he opened the lattice stealthily, and put on the window-sill, 
with care and solemnity, the portion for Chert, or his emissaries, 
saved from the evening meal. 

Then he closed the window once more, and went contentedly to 
bed. In the morning they would .seek the kvass and bread again; 
and as Chert dia not often want it, it was generally there. But not 
always; now and then it was taken, and Chert was gratified, they 
said; and the day went well with them, their good deeds sheltering 
the household from that evil eye. So they said, and muttered their 
prayers apid trimmed their Riza lamp, and went to their work again. 
So saying, but with a shrewd, unspoken knowledge in their hearts 
of what sort of Chert had come: straggling wayfarers, silent, mys- 
terious travelers, who, veiled under the covering of the pilgrim’s 
robe, sped sometimes over the snow by night, and lay in the shelter 
of some stable or wood-shed during the day; men who were followed 
and tracked and hunted down like the wolf from the mountains; 
fugitives who fled from exile, carrying their lives, not worth a mo- 
ment’s purchase, in their hands. 

To shelter such a fellow-being cost the postman his position and 
liberty; but the offering of a cup of kvass and a piece of bread, left 
there at midnight on the window'-sill, risked nothing; while it would 
call down upon the donor, if haply picked up by a fugitive in pil- 
grim raiment and not needed by Chert, a blessing, as for a deed of 
virtue, from the great Bogu himself. So Petrush set the kvass and 
black bread, and then, confident and self-complacent, he went off 
to bed. 


CHAPTER XXXIII. 

A MIDNIGUT WANDERER. 

Gilbert sat alone there. The wood fire still crackled, warm and 
comfortable, in the stove by his side, the iron lamp burned cheer- 
fully, and the little glowing light before the Riza shone bright and 
clear. Intense stillness reigned around him, without as within. 
Dimitri lay upon the threshold, sunk now in slumber noiseless and 
profound. By Gilbert’s side, piled up on the little wooden settle, lay 
his furs, his huge bear-rug, and his beaver-lined mantle, ready to be 
wrapped around him when he lay down to sleep. It was very late, 
and he was very weary. He had encountered immense fatigue and 
excitement during the perils of the day, but still he did not feel in- 
clined for rest or slumber. His mind was full and active, and it 
was restless and awake from some curious instinct that impelled 
him to sit on there in the deep solitude of that night. 

Many things crowded into his mind as the memory of the day’s 
adventure and its sudden danger swept over him again and again. 
He had looked death in the face that day, and the moment kept re- 
curring to him, bringing back the rush of strong thoughts which had 
swept over him in that fleeting moment. The view had flashed be- 


246 


THE SUN-MAID. 


fore him then of himself, of all his duties undone, his position de- 
serted, and his mother desolate and unconsoled. And now, mingling 
strangely with these recurring thoughts, came the memory of all the 
passionate frenzy of feeling that had fevered and devastated his heart 
during the past year. 

Once more he seemed to stand in that garden on the coteaux 
slopes; once more that thrilling voice was falling in earnest accents 
upon his ears; once more he heard her describe a life in which duty 
towered above sentiment, and in which love implied the whole 
sacrifice of self. And now at last over the wide vacant expanse, in 
which his future had seemed to lie stretched before him unadorned 
and unattractive, because bereft of her love, there seemed to creep 
up the horizon, like the distant breaking of the morn, a quiet, still 
light from that source she called “ duty,” and it shed a pure luster 
across his future way. 

Zophee could never be his, but her teachings might be with him 
always; and her standard of sacrifice should be erected asthe center 
of his life. He must live without her; but he would go home now, 
and live in such a way that she should realize it was no craven heart 
he had laid down broken at her feet. “ Farewell!” he was saying 
to her sweet image in his soul’s depth that night, as he sat realizing 
his failures there. “Farewell, and forever!” came ringing, as an 
echo of the parting of that spring morning at the chalet, again and 
again. And “ farewell!” he was still murmuring low and dreamily 
to himself, when something struck his ear, and, slowly and half 
consciously, he raised his eyes. 

He was musing still, and nothing had been conveyed to his mind, 
but a soft, crackling sound had reached him ; and though it scarcely 
roused his curiosity, it caused him thus instinctively to look up, and, 
as he did so, he started. The little, narrow window, outside which 
Petrush had placed the food and kvass, was just opposite to him. 
It looked out upon the broad and unbroken prospect; it was narrow; 
and from where Gilbert sat, only a small vista of snow was visible, 
with a minute half-circlet of the sky. As Gilbert looked toward 
this, he started, for the low, crackling noise reached him again. It 
sounded as if footsteps trod on bits of fagot that Petrush might have 
dropped by the wall. Footsteps certainly seemed to bruise some- 
thing just outside the window; and, as Gilbert started and looked 
up, a shadow passed swiftly between him and the vista of sky and 
snow. He paused for a moment, transfixed with astonishment, and 
watching eagerly, Petrush’s weird stories fioating confusedly through 
his mind. He watched, and it came again, a dark shade falling 
across the room for a second, apparently creeping forward, and 
then swiftly drawing itself away, and Gilbert sprung instantly to the 
window. 

He could look out now, far away, for miles and miles across the 
glittering and spotless plain. He could see, too, the midnight 
heavens stretching in wonderful and tranquil majesty above the 
steppes. It was a deep, intense blue, and cloudless, and forth from 
its wondrous depths came the tremulous sparkle of countless mjT- 
iads of stars. High in the blue arch gleamed the moon, shedding a 
ray of silver luster across the plain; and as Gilbert looked forth, there 
fell upon that pure, cold gleam of light a long shadow, dark and 


THE SUH-MAID. 


247 


mysterious, moving noiselevssly along. Gilbert watched and won- 
dered. It was a novel excitement, and made his heart beat. The 
stillness of the scene was so intense, the solitude was so complete; 
and the sea of snow, and the arch of Heaven in which that queenly 
moon held her lonely reign, were so grand and vast and still, as if 
utterly disdaii^ul of life and action, or any disturbing influence from 
common things; while the effect of that switt and restlep shadow, 
creeping to and fro, backward and forward, at once hesitating and 
quick, was most mysterious and fascinating, and altogether unac- 
countable and strange. 

Gillx3rt watched his eyes sparkling and eager, and again, with 
wonderful swiftness, the shadow came toward the house. It was 
close to him, and full in the moonlight ray, and for one moment, 
Gilbert could distinctly see it. It was no shadow, but a man. A 
long spare flgure, clad in the rough, dark robes of the mendicant 
zealots who wander from Pechersk to Solovets, from xVrchangel to 
Kief — a pilgrim, or some one disguised as such, one of the midnight 
visitors who creep up to the stanzia windows, and take eagerly the 
portion laid for Chert — or for them. One of these, no doubt, so Gil- 
bert realized— a man, and no spirit either of evil or of good. 

As -the pilgrim, creeping stealthily, approached the window, Gil- 
tert drew back into the shadow and then across the moon rays, the 
figure drew nearer still, and Gilbert hid himself more carefully until 
the crackling noise on the fagots came again, and he knew that the man 
was standing outside the window just below the house. There was 
a silence then. Gilbert scarce ventured to move or look out, fearing 
to scare away the pilgrim. But there was no more movement outside 
the window for some moments, and at last he ventured to bend for- 
ward and to look toward the narrow pane. And then his gaze was 
enchained there— quite fascinated— he could not draw his eyes away. 
Pressed against the coarse blue glass, he could see the outline of a 
human face, terribly haggard and worn. The dark features wers 
flattened against the window. The wild, wolf -like eyes were glar^ 
ing eagerly into the room ; they were drinking in the aspect of 
warmth and comfort— the glow from the burning lamp, the chair 
by the stove, the settle, with the fur piled high, and the recumbent 
figure of Dimitri wrapped in his bear-skin and sunk in profound 
T^^ose. With the famished expression of a wild beast of prey, the 
man gi\2ed with hungry eyes into the room, and Gilbert, from his 
hiding-place inspecting him, felt his heart throb with pity, and he 
turned impetuously to rush out and to draw the man eagerly in. 
But again he hesitated; he paused to scan the features, knowing 
well that this was probably no pilgrim, and feeling uncertain how to 
reveal his presence without frightening the poor wretch away. He 
paused; and, before he had resolved on a line of action, the face at 
the lattice was suddenly withdrawn again, and Gilbert ventured to 
bend further forward and look out once more. He saw the r.ian 
was still quite close to him, standing upright now, and looking 
away his long pilgrim’s robe casting its shadow from the house- 
light behind liim far over the plain. Gilbert saw that he had taken 
the food in his hands, and was preparing to raise the flask of kvass 
to his lips; and he saw, moreover, that the hand shook as it held 
the black bread, and that, instead of drinking from the kvass-bottle, 


THE SUX-MAID. 


248 

<lie man, after fingering it for a moment, almost let it drop from liis 
hold. 

Then, suddenly, he leaned back, staggering against the lintel, sup- 
porting himself with eager struggles to maintain his footing against 
the wall. There he rested a moment, putting the bread and kvass, 
once more upon the sill, and Gilbert could see him ^stinctly then, 
for his profile came against the glass of the little window, and the 
light flooding outward fell upon his face. A moment he rested 
thus ; still a moment longer Gilbert watched him, and hesitated, and 
paused; then an exclamation broke through the stillness of the lit- 
tle room, and Gilbert started eagerly forward. For he had seen that 
the pilgrim, in struggling once more to move and take the food 
into his hands, had reeled, tottered an instant on his wayworn and 
failing feet, and then, throwing his arms up above his head with a 
despairing gesture, he had fallen forward, and lay prostrate in the 
snow. There the morning, breaking over the steppes, would have 
found him, his bread uneaten, his kvass untouched, his body froz- 
en, and his spirit gone, had not Gilbert been there to spring for- 
ward with that loud exclamation of pitying horror, to rush to the 
door, to unbar it, to fling it open, and to plunge through the snow, 
round the house, below the window, till he reached the prostrate 
pilgrim’s side. 

It was the work of a few minutes to wind his strong arms round 
the unconscious form of the man, to raise him from the snow, and 
to bear him with a quick, impulsive effort of energy round the 
house, and in at the open door again, and to place him on the 
wooden settle, on a bed of his own warm furs. And there the pil- 
grim lay — a spare, long figure, clad in his rough robe — motionless 
and unconscious, worn ouf at last by hunger and fatigue and cold. 
And there Gilbert left him for a moment while he shut the door, 
iud opened the stove and piled up wood, and let the warm glow rush 
; it into the room, till it reached the wooden settle, and melted the 
mow-flakes that hung round the pilgrim’s robe. 

Then Gilbert kicked Dimitri, in the hope of waking him, but 
...ailed utterly in this attempt. Dimitri only rolled in his sleep and 
^oaned, as if the energetic assault presented itself to his slumbering 
imagination merely in the shape of an unpleasant dream. Beyond 
this he neither moved nor awoke for an instant, and Gilbert was 
obliged to desist in his efforts, and to turn his attention to doing all 
that he could for the unconscious stranger himself. 

He bent over the man, and caught the echo of a faint respiration 
that convinced him that, at all events, he was not dead. Then Gil- 
bert wrapped the huge bear-rug close round him, and, raising his 
head gently, supported it on a pillow improvised with his beaver 
coat. Then he hastily searched the room, and found a vodka flask, 
in which a few drops luckily remained, spared from the depreda- 
tions of Dimitri and his moujik, and this he applied carefully to the 
pilgrim’s lips. 

A faint glow creeping over the pallid cheek was the reward of 
these efforts, and Gilbert, encouraged, stirred the stove-fire vigor- 
ously again. He stimulated to the utmost the warm temperature of 
the room, and then, silent and solitary, he sat down by the uncon- 
scious man’s side, and, fixing his eyes upon the pale/lifeless feat- 


THE SUH-MAID. 249 

\ires, lie waited till lie could venture to apply the vodka flask once 
more. 

It was a strange scene, otill and solitary. The old lamp had 
burned itself out and the little rough room was lighted only 

by the crom the Riza, and the glow from the fire in the stove, 
r/imitri remained sunk in stupefied slumber, and Gilbert watched 
long, silently, and alone. He did not call up Petrush to his assist- 
ance, for he had not traveled among the moujiks of the steppes 
without discovering that a midnight visitor, wayworn and hungiy 
such as this one, was an object of sullen fear and suspicion to them. 

True, pilgiims sought the shelter of the peasant roof, as the night 
fell, without hesitation, claiming, too, the warmest spot by the 
stove-corner as most rightfully their own. But pilgrims of this kind, 
who crept up to steal Chert’s or the Domovoy’s portion from the 
frozen window-sill, and who flitted furtively on their journey 
through the moonbeams over the snow — such pilgrims were to be 
sheltered but waril}^ with grim suspicion, with much disturbance Of 
spirit and with fear. And this, especially by the Government stanzia 
master, for he never could tell who might seek that pilgrim beneath 
his roof with the break of the morning, or how sternly he might be 
called to account. 

So Gilbert, knowing this, watched through the hours in solitude, 
and called no one to help him to put the vodka between those with- 
ered lips. Time sped on, and, as the night passed the glow of life 
began slowl}’’ to deepen on the man’s worn cheek; the blood crept 
back to his lips, and sufficient power returned to him to draw in the 
fiery vodka from the flask. The strength of its borrowed life seemed 
to filter through his frozen veins at length; and the warm stove-glovr 
reaching him thawed the ice fogs that choked the respiration in his 
lungs. He breathed, he moved, he turned his head restlessly on the 
fur pillow, and at last a tremor shook his drooping eyelids; he slow- 
ly raised them, and he turned his deep-sunk eyes upon Gilbert’s 
face. A wild expression of wonder and perplexity flashed instantly 
from them. His lips parted, and words came. But, alas! they 
were incomprehensible words to Gilbert, as he bent low to listen. 

In what tongue was he speaking? Rushan — but not the people’s 
Russian, that Gilbert was accustomed to hear. So he shook his head, 
and bent his gaze earnestly upon the man’s face, and raised the 
vodka flask to his lips once more. This time it was drunk eagerly. 
Then the pilgrim sunk back again. He closed his eyes, and threw 
his head restlessly from side to side, as if memory refused to assist 
him, and as if struggling to recall its power. He evidently was very 
weak, and in that moment of silence seemed again almost to faint 
away. But a little force returned to him, and presently he opened 
his eyes once more. He met the gaze resting upon him, and the 
unfamiliar, kindly face turned toward him in the firelight ; his lips 
parted slowly again, and he strove to speak. 

This time it was in German: so far Gilbert gathered from the 
broken words, but he still could undei-stand nothing. Again he vras 
obliged to shake his head, and the man paused once more, and looked 
at him with an expression of wonder and of scrutiny. Then a light 
seemed to break in upon his mind; he muttered something low to 
himself, and then, looking up once more, he said distinctly in French: 


250 


THE 


SUH'HAID. 

“ 1 know— an Englishman! "Where am I? Ah!’' 

“ Hush!” said Gilbert, thankful to hear a language which he 
could understand. “ Hush! you are, with friends. Be at rest now: 
be still.” 

‘‘With friends!” the man murmured; then closea w again, 
and turned his head away, and Gilbert took his seat again De»ia«. 
him, and watched the prostrate form and pallid face once more. A 
mendicant pilgrim. Truly this was no member of that wandering 
band. This pilgrim came from other ranks than those which feed 
the stream to Kief and Solovetsk. 

The clear-cut, handsome features evinced a man of high-sprung 
race, and the words that had dropped from the trembling lips were 
the utterances of education and refinement. This was no common 
pilgrim he had plucked from the midnight snows; no mendicant, 
though starving and wretched, and clad in this mean disguise. 

And if not a pilgrim, what then? A fugitive! There was no 
mid-course for speculation between the two. A fugitive from the 
convict mines, and from Siberian exile; a wanderer struggling home- 
ward across the steppes. And Gilbert thought of the dark band of 
outpost scourers that had that afternoon swept the horizon between 
them and the gathering storm. Doubtless the track of a fugitive 
had been found that day near Georgievsk or Alexandrovsk ; and 
doubtless (again thought Gilbert, in his pitying heart) here was the 
fugitive and the wayfarer, the hunted and miserable man. Where 
had he hidden himself during that fearful storm? What wretched 
shelter had covered him while the Cossacks had swept over the 
snow-clad plains? Where had he come from to-night? Where had 
he been going when his strength had failed him so suddenly, and he 
had fallen down prostrate at the door? And who was he? What 
wonderful, adventurous history of exile, of daring, of revolution, of 
suffering — perhaps of crime — was hidden in the memory beneath 
that pale brow ? What was the key to his past, and what fate of 
suffering and failure was implied by his exhaustion for the future! 
Surely all was over for him, Gilbert felt, as he watched the motion- 
less and death-like foru:^ He could tread no further the weary path 
of his pretended pilgrihiage; he could never cross on foot the 
frontier, or escape from the triple death that pursued him — from the 
Cossack soldiers, from the pangs of hunger, or from the fatal sleep 
of the frozen snow. 

He roused himself from his sad and sympathetic reflections, to put 
the vodka flask, pityingly and gently, once more to the pale lips; 
and once more the man imbibed a few drops, and, gaining strength 
from it, opened his eyes and spoke a tew broken words again. 

‘‘A good friend,” he said, letting his wild eyes rest upon 
Gilbert; “ a friend with a fiery vodka flask is a wonder, indeed, on 
this snowy way. It is better than Cliert’s portion out there at the 
window. But too late, my friend, too late.” 

” ]So, no, drink,” said Gilbert, eagerly ; “ drink and rest, and you 
will get your strength again.” 

“ No, no; it is over — it is over!” murmured the man, and very 
faintly this time, the flicker of force with which he had uttered the 
first sentence sinking instantly away, “lam done this time; Imt 1 


THE SUK’-MAID. 


251 


have done them too — the flock of vultures! Did you see them 
sweeping along before the storm?” 

” Hush! Save your strength, my friend. Drink, that is it; drink 
plenty, and to-morrow you will be again upon your way.” 

“On my way! And the snow drifting, and the spring storms 
coming up fiercer and fiercer across my path, and the vultures out, 
and the peasants craved before them, and nothing but the Domo- 
voy’s portion ever left for me. On my way— ah, on my way!” 

“ Yes, and far on your way too, my friend, if four good Cossack 
horses can take you. Get strength now ; drink the vodka, and to- 
morrow will see you many versts on your way. ’ ’ 

“ Friend, and a good one, ” said the man, faintly again. And 
then he went on murmuring to himself ; and wandering away into 
Russia, he talked low and rapidly in a feverish, restless way. Gil- 
bert understood not one word, and the man soon ceased to notice 
him. He closed his eyes again and continued to murmur, tossing 
his head ceaselessly from side to side, and Gilbert watched and 
listened. He could make nothing of all the mutterings, except that 
here and there the name of a place would catch his ear — of places he 
had himself passed through within the last few weeks, and of which 
the Russian names and their pronunciation had become familiar. In 
his rapid murmurings the man repeated some of these again and again. 
Suddenly Gilbert started: in a low, vehement, muttering way, the 

pilgrim was talking of Orenzitz, and the name G tza, who was 

the old chief of the ix)lice commission there, came in mingled with 
his Russian words; and Gilbert started, for the recollection rushed 
over him of the last hour he had spent at Orenzitz, standing in the 
chief commissioner’s office, speaking to him of a fugitive, of a con- 
vict who was missing, of a man who had escaped them, and for 
whom Gilbert had been inquiring with a persistency and interest 

that seemed to those he questioned to be very strange. Old G 

tza’s last words in answer occurred to him now. 

“ Depend upon it,” he had said, speaking of that missing convict, 
“ he got south before the snow set in, and over to Cis-Caucasia; but 
the Cossacks along there are on the watch for him, and he will be 
clever if he gets over the frontier alive. ” 

Those were the last words that Gilbert heard in Orenzitz, as he 
was starting in his teljega toward the frontier, through the Trans- 
Caucasian snow. And now the man was murmuring of Orenzitz, 

and muttering in strange, terrified, and stealthy tones of G tza, 

in his native Russian tongue. And Gilbert started, and once more 
he listened and waited. Suddenly the half -conscious man moved on 
the settle, turned restlessly round with the quick energy of fever, 
threw his arms up wildly for an instant, and then dropped them 
heavily again; and Gilbert rose to his feet, and stood watching the 
quick change that was taking place. The faintness had yielded to 
fever, and the paroxysms of fever were alternating with heavy 
stupor now, for his mutterings became feebler every instant, and his 
head sunk low and heavily upon the soft pillow. 

Gilbert stood and watched silently, while curious thoughts 
crowded into his mind, and wonder at the weirdness of the whole 
circumstance overpowered him, as he looked at the prostrate form, 
at this strange midnight visitor, who had come so unexpectedly be- 


252 


THE SUH-MAID. 


fore him across the moonlit plain, out of the silence of that desert of 
snow, out of space, out of nothing, as it were, to lie down upon his 
resting-place, warmed with liis coverings, and revived by his care. 

The man remained still, after that momentary paroxysm of fever- 
ish strength, and he lay in his changed attitude, a little turned round 
upon the wooden couch, his head fallen back, the pilgrim’s robe 
dropping from one shoulder, wrenched open by the sudden violence 
with which he had flung up his arms. He had bared his neck, too, 
in the effort, and he lay now with his fine-turned, muscular throat 
and chest uncovered, save by the ragged beard which hung down, 
bushy and neglected, and by something that was in such a place curi- 
ous to see. It was a narrow golden chain, wound closely round the 
neck, with the end hidden carefully away. It caught Gilbert’s eye, 
and he knew the tale it told. fugitive has ever some such treas- 
ure carried secretly, kept through every peril, and preserved against 
every temptation of hunger and want; while the wears noth- 
ing golden, or of any value at all. The badge of the fugitive was 
always the secret treasure hidden away beneath the pilgrim robe. 
And there it lay upon the worn, bronze neck of Gilbert’s fugitive 
now. 

Presently the man moved again. He threw his arms up, turned 
and struggled upon his couch, his pilgrim’s frock falling back from 
his neck and shoulders more and more; and suddenly’- the gold chain 
tightened painfully round his neck, hurting and restraining him. 
Half consciously he seemed to realize that it was there. He plunged 
his right hand into the folds of his pilgrim’s robe, and with feverish, 
angry energy he pulled forth the entangled coils. 

It was a long chain of woven gold, and, as he drew it out, he held 
clutched in his hand his cherished treasures — a small dagger, a 
leathern purse, a packet of crushed and weather-stained papers, and 
a large double-faced medallion, with a bright-tinted portrait on 
either side. The articles were all firmly attached to the ends of the 
strong gold chain, and he held them eagerly clasped in his thin 
hands for a moment, as if fearful that some one wished to VTench 
them away. Then fever rushed over him again : he lost all con- 
sciousness of concern ; he flung them violently from him, and began 
struggling furiously with the golden chain. 

Gilbert bent over him, and strove to give him help; but the coils 
were hopelessly entangled, and the man was past understanding. 
He thought Gilbert wished to weave the chain closer round his pal- 
pitating chest, and with angry force he pushed his hands rough ly 
away. Then he seized the golden linivs again, and with the fearful 
and irresistible strength of his fever he toie them asunder, threw them 
from him with a wild laugh, and dashed them violently upon the 
ground. Then he fell back exhausted, and remained for some 
moments perfectly quiet and still. 

Gilbert stood by him and watched; the stillness was so deep that 
succeeded his frenzied struggle, the silence so intense that fell upon 
the little room. The man lay back, and breathed low and hard, the 
outline of his features standing up sharp and clear in the light shed 
by the Riza lamp. It hung just opposite, high above him, in the 
corner of the wall. The intense silence oppressed Gilbert; he sighed 
deeply as he stood and wondered, and the man lay prostrate and quiet. 


THE SUN- MAID. 


253 


Then he turned, his heart full of pity, his mind full of crowding 
thoughts and cuiious pain, and he stooped and raised from the 
earthen floor the gold chain, with its bunch of curious relics, which 
so long and so carefully had been hoarded on that worn breast. He 
drew the links through his Angers till the cluster of the pilgrim’s 
treasures lay in his hand. Then he paused ; he did not look at them 
for a moment; he closed his hand slowly upon them instead. The 
man’s secrets lay here in his clasp — the key to his history, the clear 
reflection of his past, his name and identity, his memories and the 
treasured relics of his love. And he had flung them from him in 
wild unconsciousness, all ignorant that he was casting down a full 
confession at a stranger’s feet. And surely — so the thought came 
to Gilbert — he must reverence the secrets thus unwittingly flung to 
him by an unconscious man, reverence and hide them, for Dimitri, 
Petrush, and Nadine would not much longer lie asleep. He must 
hide and preserve the treasures for him to whom they rightfully be- 
longed. , , . 

So he turned quickly to the corner of the room where lay his trav- 
eling knapsack, and he drew from it a case strongly clasped with 
steel. He opened this, standing beneath the light of the Riza lamp, 
and disclosed a velvet-lined interior arranged with little drawers and 
trays. He raised one of these, and then, still holding the leathern 
purse, the packet of papers, and the medallion close shut in his hand, 
he laid the jeweled dagger first in the depth of his case, and began 
slowly to wind the links of the chain closely round it on the velvet 
lining of the inner tray. It took him some inoments to do this, and 
to arrange the long coils carefully, to make it go in ; and then the 
leathern purse followed; then the papers, at which he scarcely 
glanced, and then only the medallion lay on his broad palm, as he 
opened his hand wide, looked down into it, and let the clear luster 
from the Riza lamp fall full and softly on— what he saw. 

It was a portrait, and he glanced to the wooden bed instinctively 
as he traced the features, and caught the clear reflection of tholr 
likeness in the wasted face that lay pillowed there. A likeness only, 
however— no identity. This was not a portrait of his pilgrim-fugi- 
tive, but of some one like him— much older than himself. It was 
the countenance of a handsome, stern-looking man of about sixty 
that met Gilbert’s gaze. It was a grand countenance, for while the 
features were like those of the unknown man who lay on Gilbert s 
settle, the expression was very different indeed. The type of the 
face was more Russiim, the brow was broad and noble, and the eyes 
that looked steadily forth were wonderfully calm and keen. 

It was a beautifully finished miniature. It allowed the half- 
length figure to be seen, and exhibited fully the splendid uniform of 
a &ssian councilor of state, adorned with numerous orders and 
jeweled stars. It spoke afresh to Gilbert of the rank and precedence 
of the wayworn wanderer w'hom he had sheltered, this beautifully 
executed picture, and the nobility of the countenance it portrayed 
The framework of the medallion was of richly-chased gold, and it 
was decorated with jewels, like the hilt of the little nagger he had 
just put into his case. On the top of the oval frame a large coronet 
was worked, with the letters S. V. woven into a monogram below. 

Gilbert gazed long upon the countenance, as if it enchained and 


254 


THE SU^h'-HAID. 


fascinated his interest and imagination. He examined the mono- 
gram, he admired the richness and beauty of the gold and jewel 
work on the frame, and then, very slowly, as it his gaze lingered 
wistfully over that noble and unknown face, he turned the medallion 
round upon his hand, and the soft luster of the Riza lamp streamed 
down again upon the portrait on the other side. 

The light streamed down, and for a moment it illuminated the 
countenance upon which it fell, and revealed its fair outlines to Gil- 
bert’s eyes. Then — suddenly — he seemed to see nothing; a mist 
came between him and the bright-tinted picture ; the earthen floor 
of the little cabin seemed to swing beneath his feet; Ihe beating of 
his heart was arrested; and he was quite unconscious for one deli- 
cious moment of bewildering joy. He neither realized, nor felt, 
now saw; only a low cry broke from his lips — a murmuring, won- 
dering, half-affrighted. He glanced once more with wildly dis- 
tended eves toward the unconscious man who lay tossing beside 
him, and then the mist cleared suddenly away, his brain once more 
grew calm and clear, and he turned toward the lamp-light, raised 
the medallion close up to his eager eyes, and gazed and gazed, as 
men look their first on a beloved face after years of parting — as they 
look their last before they part again. 

For it was the countenance of his dreams he saw imprinted there; 
it was the bright face of the one fair woman of his love; it was 
Zophee Variazinka, in the fair dawn of her beauty. Zophee, even 
as he had never seen her, before shadow or the weight of silence and 
suffering had been thrown across her years ; in the days when she 
was the Sun-maid indeed of her old Russian home, a bright flower 
of the South among the snows of the North-land, the joy and glory 
of old Serge Yododski’s home. There she was portrayed before 
him — the soft eyes full of laughter, the full lips paiting in a smile, 
the dusky hair swept back from a brow laden with richness of 
thought and intellect, and yet pure and fair and cloudless as a child’s. 

“Zophee! Zophee! my beloved one!’’ Gilbert murmured, as he 
gazed, still transfixed, upon her face. “ Zophee,” he continued, and 
a soft smile curled his lips. “ Zophee, galoupka moja!” he broke 
out in the sweet, caressing Russian words he had learned to love. 
“ Zophee! Zophee!” 

His eyes suffused, and his cheek flushed crimson. He was quite 
unconscious of eveiy other circumstance in existence: he felt noth- 
ing save that he looked upon her face once more, that he answered 
her smile, that he drank in the radiant light of her eyes, and that he 
could whisper fond, foolish words to her, and fancy them almost 
answered and heard. For a moment he was happy, quite free from 
recollection— absolutely anU perfectly happy— without any reserve. 

Then a sound broke in upon his trance, a sound that roused him 
up to recollection, to bewilderment, to realization: and he turned, 
closed his hand fast over the medallion, and looked toward the low 
wooden bed. The man who lay there was moving and muttering 
again, tossing back the rough hair from his forehead, and throwing 
himself with feverish restlessness from side to side. And Gilbert 
paused, and silently watched him for an instant, while, like a great 
wave, revelation was breaking slowly over his inner consciousness 
of who this wild fugitive must be. The recollection of the muttered 


THE SUIn-MAID. 


255 

name of tlie place from whence he was flying, of the old chief com- 
missioner, who was the pursuant he most dreaded there: the recol- 
lection of a thousand things, and perceptions, too, of countless links 
in the chain of circumstance ana evidence, came rushing into Gil- 
bert’s mind; and here now— the crowning proof, the portrait of 
Zophee Variazinka— of her who had been Zophee VododsKi for one 
fleeting day. The portrait in this man’s possession announced him, 
beyond every possibility of doubt, to be /mn— her lawful husband; 

the exile from K on that hateful day of her marriage, and of 

the effort upon the emperor’s life : the convict of the mines ; the 
man who was being tracked and hunted; the man whose existence 
had fallen like a black shadow across Gilbert’s life; the man for 
whom he had searched through months of hopeless travel and toil ; 
the man whom he had never thought to find now, whom he had 
never thought to see. 

There he lay— for it yas he undoubtedly— Mettrai Vododski, the 
son of the Grand Councilor of the Eussian Empire, and the destined 
husband of Zophee Variazinka, indeed. 

Strong, wild thoughts rioted through Gilbert’s mind as he looked 
at the man and realized that it was he. Dark, confused feelings 
rushed over him, and bewildered him with their pressure and their 
contradiction. Pity and resentment, hatred and commiseration, 
fought and struggled madly together in his heart. 

He stood gazing on Vododski’spale face. Ah, the sin and suffer- 
ing hidden there — the fighting and the failure buried in that miserable 
past! Ah, the sorrow inflicted in one short passionate history, lived 
out wildly and unrestrained ! The bleeding father’s heart, the lonely 
life on the coteaux of the Pyrenees, the suffering in Gilbert’s own 
past, and the long sentence of unmerited pain lying upon his future. 
All had been the work of t/as man, all the results of his vain and 
unprofitable existence, all the fruit of his misguided deeds; and 
here now he lay. Here, helpless and unconscious, wrapped in Gil- 
bert’s coverings, wooed back into life by his care, thrown upon his 
protection, at his mercy, owing the existence of every moment to 
his solicitude, and retaining life and freedom at his will. 

The situation was strong and bewilderingT and as Gilbert stood 
there and realized, his breath came fast and strong with the intensity 
of his emotion and excitement. He held the precious medallion 
close in his hand, as if passionately to retain it against every possi- 
ble claimant, every intervening right ; and he struggled with hyn- 
self for composure, and set his teeth tight and firm, and looked at 
the fever-tossed man as he lay there, quite unconscious of his sur- 
roundings or of his fate. 

The sight of him seemed to madden Gilbert at last. The heat of the 
small room suffocated him; his heart beat so fiercely, and his brain 
burned like fire. He turned away from the settle again. He 
opened the hand that inclosed the medallion; he looked at Zophee’s 
portrait again, and at the calm, handsome features of-Mettrai’s 
father painted on the other side ; and then he examined the links 
of the chain carefully, and found he could detach the pendant with 
a little harmless force. And he did so, murmuring to himself, 
“ More right than he, surely. She was never his; and 1 love her — 
I love her; 1 have more right than he.” 


256 


THE SUET-MAID. 


A little effort, and the gold-framed portrait- case lay loose upon 
his hand. He closed up then his leathern box: he locked it ; and 
fastened the steel clasps securely one by one, and he restored it to 
his portmanteau — a sacred charge, as he felt from man to man; not 
to him from Mettrai Vododski, but just from the pilgrim-fugitive 
whom he had rescued in the snow. All these should be restored 
again one day to him to whom they rightfully belonged: but the 
medallion with the portraits? He thrust it deep into his bosom, still 
holding it tightly clasped in his hand; and then, pressing it close to 
the throbbing pulses of his heart, he turned and went to the house- 
door. He felt he could not breathe in there any longer; and he 
could not think, for the fire of his passionate excitement so tortured 
and bewildered his brain. 

He opened the door and went out, and he stood there, closing it 
fast behind him, and then he leaned back against the door-post, and 
lifted up his eyes to the blue archway of Uie sky. The clear shim- 
mering stars gleamed down upon him, and the moon cast her silver 
rays across his face. It w^as intensely cold, but the night was still: 
he could bear it for a few minutes as he stood panting and drawing 
in deep draughts of the pure, fresh air. The expanse of snow 
stretched vast and calm before him, the passionless stillness of the 
moonlight resting upon all. The air cooled his brow, and the night 
brought tranquillity to his brain ; and he looked up and gazed, and 
lost his way amidst the myriads of the sparkling stars, while the 
omnipotence of creative majesty seemed to reach him, to still his 
struggling spirit, and to soothe the feverish promptings of his heart; 
and standing there, in silence and amidst that mighty solitude, in 
the deep and hidden places of his soul he prayed, hard and strong 
and ceaselessly, as a man prays who feels the Dark One pressing 
close upon his footsteps, and that evil is coming nigh unto his life. 
He prayed that his heart might remain brave and true against every- 
thing, and that the fearful temptation which was possessing him 
might pass away safely from his soul. 

He held her portrait there, fast clasped against his beating heart, 
and his love was so deep and so strong for her that the sight of that 
pictured countenanceliad unnerved him, and the storm of passionate 
longing that swept over him had annihilated all self-control. He 
loved, and he longed so bitterly, so utterly, with every strong pulsa- 
tion of his eager heart; and there, on that wooden settle by thestove- 
fi*’e, which he himself had heaped to warm him, lay that man, hated 
while yet unknown to him, who had cursed his life and hers. And 
this man Gilbert had nursed into life again that night; this man he 
had rescued and borne in his arras from out of the frozen snow ; 
and there the man lay at his mercy now, to do with him according 
to his will. 

Do? It was merely requisite to do— nothing. To stay out there, 
while the cold allowed nim, in the still night air, or to creep back 
and lake a rug from the fur-heap on the settle, and to lie down by 
Dimitri’s side, and the man would die. The morning, which was 
already breaking over the far horizon, would not, when it reached 
its fullness, find him there; the sunrise would shine in at the nar- 
row window upon Mettrai Vododski, lying harmless and dead. 

This Gilbert knew, and thence the fierce temptation, the poisoned 


THE SUK-MAID. 


257 


words in which the devil told him to let Mettrai die ; told him that 
his should not be the hand to bring him succor, his the voice to re- 
call that worthless life; that he need not strive and watch and toil 
all the night through to draw him back into existence, since he had 
slipped already so very quietly and so very far away. It needed but 
to leave him, to let him alone, and then the letters and the portraits 
would be his indeed, and all the full evidence which they carried 
that he had seen Vododski die. And in the future, what more might 
be his? O Godl O God! and he loved her so! 

Thus the spirit of fierce temptation came, sweeping again and 
again in that swift-fleeting moment over Gilbert’s soul, stimulating 
and feeding: his fevered pulses as he held her portrait to his heart. 

How he fought it, how he struggled with the memories breaking 
over him of so many things, how he conquered, God and his own 
conscience only can ever know. But he turned at last, cast one 
lingering look at the soft light rising far away in the horizon, shed- 
ding a fair, fresh glow from the coming day; and then he went into 
the house again, shut the door, walked calmly across the hot, close 
room, and bent over the settle by Mettrai’s side. 


CHAPTER XXXIV. 

ESCAPED. 

Wrapped in his pilgrim’s robe, Mettrai was now quietly sleep- 
ing. He seemed surely better, a glow as of returning color rested in 
a faint flush upon his face. He breathed softly, and seemed to have 
passed from his stupor into a quiet sleep, Gilbert sat down beside 
him once more, and gazed, as he had done during hours of the past 
night, on the unconscious countenance. His own had grown very 
pale, but he was quite composed now, and a calm light gleamed in 
his eyes. 

Presently he rose again, and lifted Mettrai gently in his strong 
arms, and smoothed the heaped-up bundle on which he had pillowed 
his head. And then, with a curious expression gathering upon his 
face, he laid the medallion softly upon Mettrai’s pillow, and ho 
pushed it nearer and nearer, until the vivid coloring in the girl’s 
portrait lay close against Mettrai’s cheek. Then once more ho 
watched and waited. 

The morning came breaking in at length as he sat there, flooding 
with crimson light the expanse of untrodden snow, and with the 
morning awoke Dimitri, and with his awakening came his outburst 
of wonder and consternation to find a stranger lying crouched 
among the furs by the stove-corner, and his master sitting upright 
by his side. Fast following Dimitri came Petrush, and his good 
wife, and the inka, all waking early to meet the sunrise, and rising 
to live eagerly every instant of their short bright day. 

They crowded into the house-room, ana great were the wonder 
and the turmoil that ensued. It was in vain Gilbert struggled to sup- 
press them, or to hush the mingled voices: in vain. They were sus- 
picious as well as curious, their tongues wagged loudly, and all at 
once, in speculation and dismay. Fieice tumult prevailed imme- 

^^^Th^ roused Mettrai, and the fever returned to his pale cheeks in 
consequence, and delirium mounted once more to his brain. He 

9 


THE SUK-MAID. 


258 

began to mutter incessantly in words and sentences revelations 
which Dimitri was well able to understand, and before long the 
latter shook his head, and glanced with consternation at Gilbert. 
He made him agitated signs, and exclaimed in French at last, as he 
listened to ihe low, quick muttered words, “ No pilgrim this, sir. 
Whom, in the name ot Heaven, have we here?” 

And Gilbert shook his In^ad in answer, and glanced at Petrush 
and his wife, and whispering to Dimitri, “ 1 will help him who- 
soever he may be,” he bent over the wooden bed once more, listened 
to Mettrai’s murmurings, and caught many names that made his 
heart beat, and thrilled him with strange excitement again. For 

Vododski ceased to mutter at last of Oreuzitz, and of G tza, the 

old commissioner there, or of any of the hard months of his flight 
from Siberia, or the latter periods of his life; and his mind and 
fevered memory seemed to take a strange turn, for he was murmur- 
ing now in gentler accents of other and far older scenes. Gilbert 
could catch other names mingling with his confused talk— memories 
of youtli and boyhood, surely, of far-away and happier times; and 
while he listened, four sad, sweet lines he had read somewhere came 
echoing through Gilbert’s mind: 

“ When the last fight is o’er, and life is done with. 

And we wander in the spirit and the brain, 

We drowse back in dreams to the days that life began with, 

And their tender light comes back to us again.” 

After a time a deep sadness came falling over Gilbert; the cease- 
less echoing of that rambling, unconscious voice was too much for 
him; he was woin out and unnerved, and the whole scene overcame 
him — the noise of the chattering family, busy over their morning 
arrangements, boiling the samovar, and trimming the little Riza 
lamps, and the ceaseless, painful sound of the feverish tones grow- 
ing every moment more faint. And then Gilbert felt as if he could 
endure it no longer. He called to Dimitri to take his place, and lie 
went out to the door again. The morning had risen now, fresh and 
beautiful over the snow plains. 

Low in the horizon lay broad streaks of golden glor^% heralding 
the rising of the sun ; and, clear as an expanse of burnished silver, 
the glistening snow lay beautiful under the flush of the morning, as 
the face of a V'enus lighted with the smiles <if love. The extent of 
the view seemed unlimited; and, as far as the eye could reach, it 
w’as spotless and unbroken, save in one distant corner — far away. 
But this little, far-off corner arrested Gilbert in one moment. He 
fixed his gaze scrutinizingly upon it, he watched, he drew his 
breath, and the sunrise and the scenery were forgotten. 

The object, dark against the rose-flush of the sky, was “ no big- 
ger than a man’s hand,” as the cloud might have been of old that 
foretold the storms and rain-fall. But he had seen it before; tlie 
small dark band, sweeping like a flock of vultures across the hori- 
zon, scouring swift as storm-birds on the wing coming out ot the 
distance, turning toward the sun, rushing like the whiilwind over 
the snow — whence came they? Whither were they fleeing on their 
swift, wild way? 

He stepped in and called furtively to Dimitri, and passed out with 
him again, heedless of Nadine’s entreaties, that he would drink of 


THE SUK-MAID. 


259 

the morning chai, and hearing only the feeble moans, from the set- 
tle that greeted his ears painfully as he paused a moment in the 
room. The muttered words seemed hushed now, and there was 
only that faint, sinking moan. 

What is Dimitri?” he exclaimed, when he had drawn his 
servant outside the house. “ What is that?” he said, pointing in 
the direction of the dark specks that weie passing swiftly against 
the sky; and Dimitri started. 

“Cossacks! soldiers!” he cried, immediately, “An outpost band 
— scourers — on the track of a fugitive —after somebody of whom a 
scent has been found! Ah!” he added, drawing his breath and 
shaking his head mysteriously. “ Ah!” and he pointed silently be- 
hind him across his shoulder toward the post-house room. 

“ Heavens!” said Gilbert, suddenly, “ do you think really it can 
be he?” 

“ 1 am sure of it,” said Dimitri. “ However, poor devil, does it 
matter? Not much, sir, as far as 1 can judge; though, if they found 
him, with the breath of life in his poor body, God knows if they 
would leave him in peace to die.” 

“The hounds!” Gilbert muttered, fiercely, as he watched the 
dark band of scourers sweeping hither and thither — track-hunting 
across the snows. 

“ Yes, hounds indeed! So they scent a man like a wolf or any 
ravening beast of prey — scent him, and track him down — curse 
them ! God help me, 1 never failed to give a fugitive a strengthening 
hand; but he — ah, twenty times he muttered this morning they 
should not take him alive. Bui if they come— and good God ! they 
are coming!— just Heaven, help him, and defend the suffering! 
They are veering, the vultures. See — see, sir; watch the curving of 
their ranks now, as they sweep to and fro. They have found the 
track, they are coming. See; they are bending in this direction; they 
are coming this way.” 

And truly, as Dimitri spoke, the black curving line seemed to 
come toward them nearer and nearer, swift as the rushing tide, 
until from black specks and lines and masses looming against the 
glowing curtain of light, they grew before Gilbert’s eyes into com- 
pact little companies of horsemen, galloping with frantic speed 
across the snow. 

An exclamation broke from Dimitri, and he rushed back into the 
house, and the tidings of the coming band broke from him in Rus- 
sian in his strong voice, loud, resonant, and clear ; and perhaps the 
dull ear of the half-conscious man on the settle heard him, perhaps 
the cry smote his fluttering heart with a death-blow, as it roused his 
dormant senses to a momentary energy of life, for he sat up and 
looked wildly round him ; and as Dimitri sprung to the couch and 
bent beside him, he uttered quick, broken words in Russian, and in 
tones wonderfully strong and clear. 

He called his father’s name and Zophee’s; his hand felt instinct- 
ively for the missing links of his golden chain, and then fell, feeble 
and unconscious, on the medallion that lay on the pillow beside 
him. He called out, “ Russia! Russia! my country, 1 am com- 
ing!” and “Freedom! freedom!” he uttered in failing accents 
again and again. Then, as Petrush and Nadine turned pale and 


THE SUN-HA.ID. 


260 

trembled, and as the sound of confusion, and of the jangling of 
horses’ trappings, and the noise of loud voices reached their ears, he 
fell back, and Dimitri’s outstretched arms received him as his head 
sunk down. 

Gilbert, closely followed, sprung at that moment in at the door. 
He reached the couch, and seized something that lay upon the pil- 
low, and only just in time. Grim faces crowded behind him; cruel 
and relentless eyes glared into the room, all hungry and impatient , 
for their prey. But it had escaped them. They had hunted him 
down at length — the poor fugitive — but too late. As they rushed in, 
dressed in their curious trappings — a band of Cossack soldiers of the 
Cis-Caucasian steppes — they saw at once that they were too late, and 
angry curses broke from them all. 

Slettrai Vododski lay sleeping calmly in the safe, quiet haven of 
— death; his marble features peaceful as they had rarely been 
through all his feverish life of futile and passionate struggle, his 
worn countenance expiessing rest. And the Cossack soldiers turned 
away, muttering in loud oaths their disappointment. There was no 
victim for them, no booty — absolutely nothing at all. For Mettrai 
Vododski lay dead there, and the precious jeweled medallion, con- 
taining Zophee Yariazinka’s portrait was hidden away, close pressed 
once more against Gilbert’s fast-beating heart. 

CONCLUSION. 

MI-CAREMB. 

Everybody said “ it had been a quiet winter this year at Pau.*’ 
All sorts of people had been missing who were generally there. 
The St. Hilaires had come little to town, and Madame Yariazinka 
had not once crossed the valley from the coteaux the whole season 
through. 

That good-looking young English huntsman. Sir Gilbert Erie, 
who had been first in the field and gayest in tne ball-rooms all the 
year before, was reported “ coming ” during the whole of the season, 
and still never came. 

Morton de St. Hilaire was married, and had gone off somewhere 
with his Jeanne. Several well-known faces had been missing in the 
American set, and the influx of English visitors proved “heavy 
families ” this year. 

Altogether there was little excitement, and people discovered sud- 
denly that Carnival was nearly over, and that they had done next to 
nothing at all. Then Lent came upon them, and they were still 
saying what a dull time they had had of it, when, about the second 
week of that “fasting season,” a reviving impetus was suddenly 
given to society by a large and unexpected arrival which took place. 

In a special train, accompanied by his wife and family, and with 
an enormous suite, our old acquaintance, the Russian Grand Duke 
George, returned once more to Pau. 

He came, as he had promised, to revisit the Pyrenees; and, as the 
only fitting residence for such august visitors, the old chateau was 
lent to them for the time. In this picturesque and historic residence 
they all soon settled themselves. 

A curious party in a curious place, Pau said of them, at the same 
time delighted to see them there. They brought something to talk 


THE SUiS>xMAID. 


261 

about, something to look at, and, if Lent had not intervened so in- 
conveniently, somebody to entertain. 

And first, Pau did talk of them; and on the Place, and along the 
Boulevard, and in the club, most wonderful things were related by 
people who felt qualified to know. And by and by people saw them 
—first, their old acquaintance, the Grand Duke George himself, 
promenading the Boulevard on a Sunday, two days after his arrival, 
hianing on the arm of his aid-de-camp. Count C;hellavefl:, and talk- 
ing aifably, as the public were pleased to perceive, with Sir Alex- 
ander Maynard, that kind friend and adviser of the new-comer of 
every degree. 

It was a lively Sunday altogether, for there was plenty to discuss 
and see; while the Duke George promenaded and smoked a cigar, as 
be passed up the Place Royale, and paused to converse with the 
Princess and a knot of ladies whom he found grouped round the 
pedestal of Henri IV. ; and finally as he went into the club and had 
himself there enrolled. Evidently the grand duke had retained 
pleasing recollections of his visit of last year, and meant now, on 
his return to Pau, to be particularly gregarious and sociable. 

The next day numbers of people had to tell each other of a string 
of funny little children who had been seen filing out from under the 
portico of the chateau, and trotting through the prim gardens over 
pathways w^here many royal children had trodden in the old time be- 
fore; passing round Triquetti’s prett}'- statue, and going dowui below" 
the park, over the grass, westward to the site of the Kiosk of Isabel, 
and to the green secluded spot where Marguerite de Valois had med- 
itated often by the Fond d’Ecus. And that same afternoon there 
was more to talk about; for a few fortunate loiterers by the huge old 
gates of the chateau had been privileged to see a large barouche drive 
out, which contained the Duchess of Olga herself. She looked dis- 
tinguished, people said, “ and rather interesting, and very evidently 
she was dressed by — ’Worth.” 

The carriage passed down the Place Gramont, and went swiftly 
over the bridge, through Jurancon, and away along the road toward 
the Gelos coteaux, and people said that ” she had gone to visit the 
odd little Russian over at St. Hilaire, w^hom Erie had been so mad 
about last year;” and, strange enough, though “ people” said so, it 
was true! 

Finally, having looked at this party, and talked about them till 
there was little more left to say, Pau was delighted one fine day by 
the circulation of the rumor that at Mi-Careme (Mid-Lent) the prefet 
and Madame de Frontignac intended that they should be entertained. 
And as time went on, and Mi-Careme drew near, the interest and the 
excitement of the rumor increased tenfold, until it ceased to be a 
rumor at all; and cards were issued, and Pau burst into a whirlwind 
of wild enthusiasm, and a fever of expectation and delight; for 
Madame de Frontignac not only announced herself ” at home ” on 
the night of JMi-Caieme, and requested that everybody who w’as any- 
body at all would come and ” pass the evening with her;” but in 
the remote right-hand corner of the invitation-card was inscribed the 
announcement that it was going to be a ” fancy ball.” Moreover, 
the guests- might be masked or half-masked, if they pleased; but 
they would in that case be required, to unveil their countenances and 


262 THE SUK-MAIH. 

reveal their identity to the private secretary of the prefecture on 
their way upstairs. 

Altogether, the prospect was magniticeiit, and the excitement, 
waxed high and keen. The invitation had Jilso announced, among 
all these other things, that the guests were invited specially to meet 
8. A. 1. tire Grand Duchess Olga and the Grand Duke George. 

This intimation gave, of course, a certain zest to the proceedings. 
For the whole time intervening between the invitations and the 
night of Mi-Careme, people talked of their costumes, and much 
greatness of imagination and ignorance of biography were displayed. 
Also, though much mystery was brought to bear upon the prepara- 
! tions, and iio one was intended to find out what anybody else was 
i going to wear, the important secrets were confided confidentially on 
so many sides and to so many people, that long before the interven- 
ing weeks had gone by tire prospects as to general costume were uni- 
versally known. But tiiis only served to stimulate anticipation. 
People were really exercised in their minds to conceive how Mrs. 
Vere 'would look as the Panther Queen; what sort of figure Mrs. 
(’arder would make as a Spanish duenna; and how that very proper 
Ml'S. Derford intended to personate the charming but rather ques- 
tionable character, Gabrielle d’Estrees; and then, who was to be her 
Henri? People were much engaged, too, in agreeing that Mr. Dal- 
ton Hart was absurd in thinking himself sufficiently good-looking 
for Monte-Oristo, or Miss Coddrington in imagining she had the fine 
coloring or lithe figure of a Contadina Romana. 

So, for many days, it went on ; and, indeed, before the eventful 
night arrived, nearly everyone had had a glimpse of everyone else’s 
dress, and so recognition was not quite impossible, though the effect 
w'as most bewildering, when they met together finally— the whole, 
little, gay community — to admire, to laugh at, to exclaim at each 
other, in the long salon of the Prefecture on the evening of Mi- 
Careme. 

The Prefecture is a quaint old building. It is plain enough ex- 
ternally, its only distinctive feature being the national fiag, which 
hangs ever over the huge gateway, that incloses the old-fashioned 
court-yard. 

But within the 'house is picturesque, and its salons richly decor- 
ated; and when lighted up and filled with a gayly-dressed crowd, 
on these festive occasions, the scene is brilliant and effective. 

There is one long ball-room, furnished in pale-gold color, with 
paneled and decorated walls, and with copies of Rubens's portraits 
of Henri and of Gabrielle flanking the handsome old carved fire- 
place on either side. A small salon opens off each end of this, one 
of which was arranged for general teie-d-iete aod fiirtations, while 
the other was set aside for the ducal party, and for other great per- 
sonages to-night. 

Many of our old friends were there: the Baron Keffel, resplendent 
in a white waistcoat — as usual caustic and inquisitive; Bebe Beres- 
ford, who had been out to America to fetch Miss Netley, whom he 
had captured and brought back again; Madame de St. Hilaire, in a 
lovely toilet, and many others. 

Everybod)’- was there, as particularly requested, early, awaiting 
the arrival of the august guests, and the scene was very marvelous 


THE SUH-MATD. 


263 

indeed. It was like a dazzling and bewildering dream. Every age 
of the world, and every clime and country ever heard of, seemed to 
have sent the homage of its quaintest dress. 

The variety of strange costume was quite extraordinary, and the 
variety in the manners in which people bore their change of appear- 
ance and personality was more extraordinary still. A motley, brilJ- 
iant crowd they were— our gay Pau friends— that night, as they 
stood together, or sauntered up and down, laughing, chattering, 
wondering over each other and themselves, awaiting the arrival of 
the ducal party to allow the dancing to begin. There were many 
curious combinations, too, among the promenading couples, that 
heightened the quaintness of the whole effect. A Dresden shepherd- 
ess on one side paced slowly, hanging on the arm of a wliite musket- 
eer; a stately lady in a splendid V^enetian dress, followed just be- 
hind them with the Emperor of China. Mary Queen of Scots was 
pyly laughing a little further on, and glancing up archly at Mepli- 
istopheles, as he bent to whisper in her ear. A graceful Neapolitan 
sailor escorted a “ Northern Winter ” with an evident harmony that 
was remarkable. Elizabeth Gunning walked with a Hungarian 
huiitsman. Madame de Vismes leaned on the arm of the Earl of 
Surrey from the court of Henry VIH. Schaffhausen peasants 
strolled with courtiers from the age of Queen Elizabeth; and Un- 
dine floated past, with Charles Surface in her train. Moonlight, 
Starlight, Summer, Autumn, and May-queens swept to and fro in 
airy procession, with mountaineers from every range of Europe, and 
boatmen of every sea. Mexican nobles, Spanish brigands, and En- 
glish tars conducted such varieties of marvelous costumes as you 
would imagine they could have met only in their dreams! The 
scene in the old Salle of the Prefecture was curious and brilliant 
indeed. 

At the entrance door stood the prefet and Madame de Frontignac, 
waiting to receive the Russian guests. Near where they stood sat 
the Princess; a Maori chieftain stood close behind her; Romeo leaned 
over her chair ; Grimaldi shook his bells just in front of her; and 
the Maid of Athens sat by her side. Several Basque and Pyrenean 
peasants had been scattered through the rooms; and these, with a 
group of the Hunt Club of Pau, in their red coats, had been drawn 
by Madame de Frontignac round the door to receive the grand-du- 
cal party as they entered. And this elect few, not being of the most 
sober and reverential portion of the Pau community, were just get- 
ting tired of this part of the ceremonial, and a little restive under it, 
when the band suddenly ceased tuning their instruments, and, at a 
signal, struck up the Russian national air. The portieres were flung 
back, and Madame de Frontignac went forward toward the corridor, 
and the pretet disappeared. The Princess rose, and everybody 
stared and waited, and a buzz of expectation ran through the room. 

Then the prefet re-entered again, leading the Duchess Olga, and, as 
people made their salutations, a murmur of satisfaction arose. The 
grand duchess had thrown herself into the full spirit of the enter- 
tainment, and had come to the bedtravesti in the bcautilul national 
costume of her race. It was a dress similar to that of the Tsaiitsa, 
which is preserved in the Winter Palace, with the crown of the ein- 
])ire, and the imperial scepter of all the Russias, with the Oiioff 


264 


THE SUH-MAID. 


diamond at its tip— a costume the Tsaritsa wears sometimes at pop- 
ular national fetes. It was very picturesque; a high cap towered 
upon the duchess’ head, a vest of crimson velvet contrasted richly 
with the dark-hued kaftan reaching to her knees ; the skirt was short, 
and the whole costume was embroidered in a graceful scroll-work, 
of which the pattern was marked out, and set round thickly with 
brilliants and seed-pearls. A superb girdle, woven in chain-work, 
inclosed her waist, and two long tassels fringed with diamonds hung 
from the jeweled clasp. The dress was brilliant and effective, and, 
like the Tsaritsa’s in the Winter Palace, regal in the splendor of its 
composition, if rustic in its original design. 

The duchess, moreover, was half masked, by M'hich she signified 
that she came incognita — in her private character to a private enter- 
tainment — and that all etiquette and formula might be dispensed 
with from the time she entered the room. For this the community 
were much obliged to her; or gt least they would have been, if they 
had realized half the requirements of Russian etiquette, and the 
strictness and rigidity with which it is enforced. 

The Duchess Olga entered, gave her hand to the Princess, and 
took the seat by her side to which Madame de Frontignac invited 
her. Close behind her stood two attaches in imperial uniform, and 
two ladies of honor, attired very difiCerently from herself. Both 
were dressed in black lace, and one of them, like the duchess, was 
partially masked. 

The figure of the unmasked lady of honor was tall and stiff -look- 
ing; there was nothing in her appearance to engage the attention or 
attract the eye; but with the other it was different. In that slight, 
graceful, lace-draped figure, standing just behind the Duchess Olga’s 
chair, there was something singularly attractive, something that 
caused the scrutinizing gaze to wander upward to the half-concealed 
face, to linger on the beautifully turned chin, peeping from beneath 
the mask, to trace the lovely contour of the head and neck, to note 
the beauty of the delicate ear, and the soft line wdth which the hair 
swept back from the forehead; something that made one long to 
draw that hateful mask away. 

The lady stood perfectly still and silent, speaking only when the 
grand duke passed round and addressed her a few words, and mov- 
ing only when, presently, the princess rose and left her seat vacant, 
and the great Russian lady, who was pleased to decline to dance, 
turned and signaled to this young attendant to come round and sit 
down by her side — which she did; and they talked rapidly together 
in Russian, the duchess speaking much and familiarly, stooping 
forward often to lay her hand upon her young friend’s with an 
eager, impulsive clasp. They were left to talk together; for the 
national hymn of Russia was over presently, and the first bars of 
some dance-music were heard. And the grand duke bowed gravely 
to Madame de Frontignac, and the prefet led forth the Princess, and 
a young Italian prince stood next them, with a bright little Amer i- 
can for his partner, and a real Spanish grandee for his vis-d-vis on 
the opposite side; and they danced a quadrille— with much grace and 
high ceremony; and it was a very fine sight indeetl. 

Everybody else began dancing at the same time, and all down th(; 
huge room they twirled and glided, and did “ ladies’ drain Dres- 


THE SUH-MAID. 


265 

den shepherdesses, Grecian brigands, Scottish chiefs, and ISew Zea- 
landers, all dancing amiably together in delightful contusion, and 
with a marvelous and bewitching effect. 

Then the ball went on much like other balls, and people forgot 
their history, and arranged their minds, and grew quite accustomed 
to seeing Amy Robsart waltzing with Caiactacus, and Boadicea 
polkaing calmly with Captain Macheath. It all seemed quite nat- 
ural long before the cotillon came on. 

There was some fear expressed at one time that there would be no 
cotillon, some pereons considering the ceremony of the occasion too 
high; but such fears were soon dissipated. The hour arrived; seats 
and benches came clattering in as usual, and people scrambled and 
squabbled and rushed about in the frantic efforts necessary to get 
themselves seated round the room. The opinion was moreover cir- 
culated that the grand duchess was very anxious to see a cotillon, as 
it is danced in all its perfection here. And sure enough, she showed 
no sign of withdrawing, but took her place, with the princess and 
Madame de Frontignac and other ladies of distinction, at the center 
of a row of very gorgeous, golden chairs. Her stately looking lady, 
of honor stood silent behind her, and the grand duchess drew her 
little friend of the black-lace dress and half-masked countenance 
down into the chair by her side. 

The cotillon was led that night by Morton de St. Hilaire at one 
end, dancing with Madame de Frontignac’s married daughter, who 
wore the English dress of the White Lady of Avenel; while at the 
other end was Freddy Vcre, who had chosen for his partner Morton’s 
little dark-eyed bride. Off they all started, with the polonaise 
figure first — danced in honor of the Russians — beginning thus as 
they do at St. Petersburg, and going on to all their other figures of 
the scarfs and the bows, and the bells and the bracelets, the flags, 
the kneeling quadrille, the grand-rond, and all the rest of it. The 
fun grew fast and furioqs, though just a very little bit tempered, 
perhaps, by the presence of that illustrious party at the head of the 
room. 

It went swimmingly on, full of en train, with intervals breaking 
in for refreshments and for transitory repose; and every one of the 
august persons on the golden chairs watched it with admiration and 
keen zest for a long time. 

But, at a certain point, it was remarkable that thq attention and 
the gaze of one of that party wandered, suddenly, and entirely from 
the dazzling crowd that was waltzing and undulating on the ball- 
room floor, and seemed conscious, indeed, of the whole gay scene of 
the ball-room no longer. It was the pair of eyes that glistened, dai’k 
and luminous, behind tlie mask worn by the lady who sat % the 
Duchess Olga’s side; and these eyes were turned suddenly toward 
the outer doorway, and were fixed scrutinizingly and wonderingly 
upon some one who leaned against the wall just there. 

It was evidently a new-comer, for the costume was one that had 
uol 3 ’’et been observable in the motley crowd; and perhaps that alone 
had attracted the gaze of the dark eyes that glistened bcldnd th«i 
mask. At all events the costume and its wearer seemed to interest 
lier. And yet this was not strange ; for to any of the Russian pai1y 
the sight of that dress must have been familiar, and full of associa- 


266 


THE SUH-MAID. 


tion. It was a peasant dress from the northern valleys of Vladimir, 
a moujik’s festive national attire. It was the masculine dress, in 
fact, corresponding to the one worn by the Duchess Olga, and not, 
like hers, a decorated representation of a costume, but the real thing 
itself. It was picturesque; and the man who wore it was tail, broad- 
fchouldered, and handsome enough to do credit to any attire. He 
wore a thick, brown beard flowing over his chest, a long mustache 
covered his lips, and his peasant hat was drawn far down over his 
brow and eyes. There was almost nothing to be seen of his counte- 
nance, and yet he attracted the eyes from behind the dark mask, and 
seemed to fascinate and to enchain their gaze. 

Suddenly, as the cotillon proceeded, the Duchess Olga observed 
him, this moujik, in national costume, leaning idly against the 
door. The bouquet figure was beginning, and the baskets of fresh- 
scented flowers were being borne into the room; and it was just then 
that the duchess exclaimed, in French : 

“ But, mon Dieu! dearjldadame de Frontignac, there is a country- 
man of ours standing in the doorway, and he has not danced once. 
Where is he come from? When did he arrive?” 

“A countryman I” said the grand duke, laughingly in answer, 
“ or some one, at all events, wearing our national costume. You 
forget you are at a lal trmesti.” 

” No, 1 do not,” cried the Duchess Olga; “ but 1 mean he is our 
countryman, for the moment at least, and should be my danseur for 
the night. See, he is in the dress of the same province from which 
1 took mine. 1 say he should make himself presented to me; we 
should stand side by side. And his dress is very good,” she went 
on; ‘‘just the real thing. Do you not find it so, Zophee?” she 
added, caressingly, in Russian, turning to the masked lady, her 
chosen companion, who sat still by her side. ” Does it not bring 
back to you old memories? Is not that just the dress that Vanoushki 
pittle Ivan) used to wear at the Maslianitsa — the Carnival f6te-days 
in Vladimir, when you were a child? Ah! is it not so? Look at 
him! look at him! Is it not so?” 

“Ah! your highness is kind and good indeed to cherish these 
sweet old memories,” murmured her friend, in a soft, musical voice 
that we seem to know. And she drew her breath quickly, and ap- 
parently she could say no more. Her Head drooped for an instant, 
and then she raised it again, and she turned her gaze once more, as 
the grand duchess had begged her, upon that manly figure leaning 
easily, and, as it seemed, so indifferently, upon tlie door. Poor 
Zophee! she could, in truth, say no more just then, and indeed 
throughout the whole ball, and especially during the cotillon, she 
had found it almost impossible to speak at all. 

That ball, to which she had come only in obedience to a command 
which was irresistible, had been all bitterness, to her; the gay scene 
mocking the desolate sadness in her heart; the very music sounding 
chords of memory within her, and awakening echo fiom associations 
that were pain almost keener than she could bear. 

Only at one other of these gay, brilliant balls had she been ever 
present during all her long secluded residence at Pau, and at that 
ball — he had been. Then, though for so long she would not dance 
with him, she had watched him all throuah the evening, amusing 


THE SUiq--MAID. 20? 

and enjoying herself in following his quick, agile movement, about 
the room. He had been there through the whole night, and at the 
end had been this bouquet figure just then as now. Ah! how the 
memory came rushing back to lier, for the scene of the violets and 
white lilac was even at that moment surrounding her again; and she 
seemed to see him, as ho had bent before her and extended his 
flowers to her with an upturned, pleading face. Then came the 
memory of her dance with him, and of their short walk home 
together through the glory of the Pyrenean night; and then she 
thought on and on, of manv walks that had followed after that one, 
and of many quick succeeding blissful hours and days. How well 
she remembered it ali! and was it over for them forever, and must 
it be again no more, no more? Were sunshine and love, and the 
quick, thrill of conscious happiness, gone from them both, for all 
their lifelong in the future, and would the joy of reunion never 
more be theirs? Ah! why had she been brought here? To sit sad 
and silent amidst this brilliant crowd, to be mocked by its ga3’'ety, 
and tortured by thes:* sweet strains of music that echoed in her ears? 
Why the re-awakening memories of the ball-room? And why, 
above all, why the haunting fascination that impelled her to gaze at 
that door- way? Whence the strange resemblance which kept her 
(iyes enchained irresistibly there? 

The moujik stood, apparently unconscious and indifferent, looking 
idly round the room. And he watched as the bouquets were 
brought to the party on the golden chairs, and from them presently 
carried quite round the hall, and out even to the door-ways and 
corridors, whose non-dancing people were lounging idly about. The 
moujik remained quiet until they were carried to his corner; then 
he took one bouquet from the basket which a pretty Neapolitan 
flower-girl held up to him, but he shook his head indifferently, as 
she urged him to take another. “ Was one, then, enough W him?” 
she said, archly, as she smiled at him and passed on. He bent over 
his flowers while the waltzers whirled round him on every side. 
The ball was at its height just then, and the spirit and enthusiasm 
quite exuberant. 

The moujik paused a moment, and gravely eyed the crowd; and 
then he made up his mind, apparently, for he threaded his wa}-- 
across the top of the ball-room, and went with curious directness to 
this point. He bowed low, and he offered his flowers at the feet, 
not of the Grand Duchess Olga, whose national peasant dress cor- 
responded so harmoniously with his own, but of the little friend who 
sat so quietly beside her — that slight, graceful woman whose head 
was covered with a laced domino, and whose face was half hidden 
by her mask. It seemed impossible that any one could have recog- 
nized her. And yet before her the moujik bent. He waited deter- 
minedly, and for some moments it seemed that she declined to re- 
ceive his flowers, and that he would wait in vain. For she trembled 
so, and her heart beat so violently, and such strange, wild thoughts 
of possibilities came surging through her brain, that she could not 
speak, nor move, nor notice him. But he still waited; he bent his 
head low before her, his face unseen, his shaggy beard covering his 
breast. Evidently he would take no refusal, and was determined 
not to be driven away. Yet Zophee could not speak to him. She 


THE SUH-MAII). 


268 

could only shake her head, and raise her hand deprecatingly, as if 
entreating him to go. 

At last, as he waited and bent low again, still offering his flowei-s, 
the Duchess Olga laughed, and the princess turned and said to 
Zophee, just as she had done once before, “ Always the same Zophee, 
ungrateful and ungracious. She never smiles on any cotillon knight 
who pays her his pretty homage of flowers. Ungrateful, Zophee! 
ah, really it is a shame!” 

“ Will you not dance?” said the duchess, lightly. “ See, how 
patient and devoted a cavalier, he deserves a reward.” 

But Zophee could answer nothing; her heart seemed to stand still, 
and her lips were sealed. She could only gaze at him bewildered, 
as he stood before them; and the Duchess Olga went on laughingly, 
in Kussian, again: 

“ And so excellent a moujik, too! Ah, my good comrade,” she 
added, suddenly, addressing him, “ we are from the same country. 
Are you genuine, eh? Do you speak the language of your race?” 

The young moujik bent toward her then in answer, and mur- 
mirred her name in a low tone, using the method of address and the 
title w^hich a peasant of Vladimir would have used in speaking to 
her. And the grand duchess was delighted, and laughed aloud, 
while a great tremor seized Zophee’s frame as she heard his voice; 
a film seemed to cover her eyes, a faintness rushed over her heart, 
and “Gilbert!” she exclaimed, the name rising to her lips and 
breaking from them. But it was unheard, for the duchess spoke 
loud and cheerily again. 

“ Ah,” she said, “ very good, very well said; but 1 detect an ac- 
cent— not a moujik, after all, but a capital representation of one, I 
confess. Why do you not offer your bouquet to me, instead of to 
that ungrateful little lady, who keeps you waiting there? We 
surely should promenade together, for our dresses truly suit each 
other well. Give your flowers to me, young countryman, and so 
be revenged on that little incognita, who sits so silent behind her 
mask there, and who treats your offering with such indifferent 
scorn. Give them to me, and you will be revenged.” 

“Ah, pardon me, your most gracious highness,” murmured the 
young moujik, in Russian, again. “ Pardon,” he went on, “ Wt 
my flowers are all only — for her.” And he bowed once more before 
the duchess, and then stood upright, removed his broad peasant’s 
hat, and looked straight across at Zophee, with his clear blue glisten- 
ing eyes. And the Duchess Olga laughed again, and the Princess 
started and turned pale, and Zophee rose slowly, but quite steadily 
now, and, murmuring, “ Pardon me, with your highness’ permis- 
sion,” she passed out from among the group on the golden chair's, 
and in another instant she was on the fringe of the great, dazzling, 
and whirling crowd, standing alone, and for a few seconds silently, 
by Gilbert’s side. 

They had got a new waltz down at Pau just then— the “ Manolo,” 
of Waldteufel— and people were wild about it, as they had been in 
London and in Germany all the season before, and its full, undulat- 
ing, poetic strains were floating through the ball-room like a song 
from dreamland, while Gilbert and Zophee stood there side by side. 
They did not dance, of cour-se, they only stood together for some 


THE SUN^-MAIU. 


269 

moiiieuts, when he had drawn her away a little out of the crowd, 
and the silence of intense and overwhelming joy was upon them; 
while the dancers whirled before their eyes, and the sweet music, 
floating through the air above and around them, seemed to flow over 
their spirits, and mingle with the rush of feeling and the flood of 
thought. 

“ Gilbert, Gilbert,” murmured Zophee at last, softly, her head 
drooping, and her hand clinging to his arm. “ Why did you do it? 
Why did you come to me like this? 1 am so glad! but it is too 
much, Gilbert— it is more than I can bear.” 

” Ach, ti dusha moja!” (Ah, thou soul of mine), he answered, a 
soft, passionate Russian expression of tenderness he had learned to 
understand. “ Ah, have I frightened you? Have I come too sud- 
denly? But 1 arrived in Pau only as the ball was beginning, and 1 
could not help it. I heard you were here to-night, and 1 had this 
dress with me to put on, and so 1 could not, I could not, stay away. 
My Zophee, my little Sun-maid, my love!” 

” Gilbert, hush, hush!” she murmured, in broken tones. “ Gil- 
bert, remember! do not be cruel to me. My friend, do not pierce 
and grieve my poor heart anew. I am so glad that you have come 
back; but spare me, spare me! Remember, Gilbert, my dear, best 
friend!” 

“Ah, Zophee, not my friend,” he exclaimed in answer; “ but my 
love, and my darling, and my own.” 

“ Hush, for God’s sake!” she murmured. “ Hush, Gilbert! con- 
trol 5 ^ourself — spare me; for Heaven’s sake, dear friend, be calm! 
Listen to me. 1 have much to tell you. Indeed, indeed, 1 am 
thankful — in my heart’s depths so glad and thankful--that you 
have returned. But listen, 1 have much to tell you — ” 

“And 1 have something,” he answered, gravely, “to tell you, 
my Zophee, my own one, mine, mine, forever mine. Will 3^011 
come with me? Will you come away out of all this bewildering 
medley? Will you come, Zophee? Let me take you home.” 

“ 1 think 1 must go,” she answered. “ 1 feel so faint and 
strange. I do not think I can stand this any longer. 1 must indeed 
go home. But stay, 1 must ask the grand duchess’ permission. 1 
am with her, you know. Ah, do 3^011 not remember, Gilbert,” she 
added, with a little sweet, sad smile, “ do you not remember the 
Duke George?” 

“1 should think 1 did, indeed!” said Gilbert, grimly. “But, 
after all, 1 don’t hate him as 1 used to,” he added, “ for he told me 
something once it was well worth my while to know.” 

“Take me up to the grand duchess, then,” said Zophee. And 
together they walked quietly back to the precincts of the golden 
chairs. By that time the Princess had quite recognized Gilbert 
under his long beard and in his Russian disguise, and she greeted 
him cordially, but with furtive and dismayed glances into Zophee’s 
face; and the grand duchess laughed gayly as she challenged them 
with “ being old friends.” 

Then Zophee murmured her petition; and the Duchess Olga an- 
swered, “ Certainly she might go home^^ was she lired? Well, no 
wonder. And would their countryman take her to the carriage? 


THE SUN- MAID. 


270 

Ah, that wag well. Certainly she might leave them. And lightly 
kissing her finger-tips to Zophee, she smiled her adieu. 

Then, just again as he had done once before, Gilbert led her from 
the gay ball-room, and they passed down the old staircase, escaping 
quite unnoticed, while everybody was absorbed in the last cotillon 
rounds. And they got away, without observation, through the 
crowded corridors, and out into the quaint old court-yard, where the 
carriages stood massed together, waiting patiently in the dawn. 

For it was spring-time now, and it Wiis four o’clock already; and 
the blue night, with its spangled canopy of brilliant stars, was fad- 
ing and rolling away before the break of the morning, and the old 
court-yard was softly flooded with the light of a coming day. The 
air was sweet and cool, meeting them as the}'" stood on the threshold. 
They paused, glancing simultaneously into each other’s face, and 
Zophee drew her mask away. 

“Ah! and you thought that that thing would disguise you?” said 
Gilbert. “ Did you expect that I could be for one moment deceived?” 

“ I did not expect you to be here to induce me to attempt decep- 
tion,” she answered, smiling up at him a sweet, wistful, welcoming 
smile. “ Will you call up the carriage?” she added. 

“ One of those great lumbering carriages, is it?” said Gilbert, 
presently. 

“Yes,” she answered; “ the Duchess Olga was to set me down. 
Vasilie and Ivan, with my little brougham, are not here to-night.” 

“ This morning, you mean; there is not much of night remaining 
now,” he said. 

“No; and what!a lovely morning it is going to be!” she murmured. 

“Lovely!” he exclaimed, impulsively, and then, very hurriedly, 
he went on: “ Zophee, will you not loalk home witli me? You did 
it once before. They will not be done with the cotillon for an hour 
yet, and every one of these coachmen is sound asleep. Come, will 
you not walk? Why get into that old coach? Look what a morn- 
ing it is going to be; and see, it is quite dry under-foot. Come, 
wSlk with me; will you not? It is such a little way.” 

“ 1 should like it,” she said, softly. “ But will you promise me 
— all the way from here to the Hotel de France to — to— say nothing 
1 do not want you to say? Because,” she continued, as she let her 
hand rest quietly on his arm, and allowed him to draw her across 
the court-yard and out at the great iron gates, “ because,” she said, 
“ I am so glad, so very thankful to have you back again; but you 
must remember, dear friend, there are some things you must never, 
never say to me ; some things that must make me drive you from 
me; that 1 must never hear.” 

“ Hush!” he w^hispered, softly. “ Come on a little way with me. 
1 wdll say nothing, nothing whatever, to you now.” 

And then they went on, treading the narrow pavement together, 
walking, as he wished, in silence along the Buc de la Prefecture, 
through the little narrow Kue St. Louis, past his old haunts of the 
English Club and the Rue de Lycee, and on to the Place among the 
trees, where the lamp-lights were glistening like pale stars, and fad- 
ing away before the break of day. And they passed down the inner 
avenue till they reached the grand entrance to the hotel. Then Gil- 
bert spoke again, and now in a changed and very grave, quiet tone. 


THE SUN-MAID. 


271 


“ Do not go in, Zopheo,” he said; “ come a little further with me, 
just down hero, to look once at the mountain view. 1 have some- 
thing to say to you,” he added; “come;” And she let him draw 
her on till they "reached the terrace, where they stood side by side, 
^Idiey leaned on the low parapet for a while, and gazed silently upon 
the mountains, for they w'ere very wonderful in the dawning light. 

A soft mist lay over "the coteaux, and a grejtt stillness rested upon 
the whole scene. The view was somber to westward; but away to 
the east, where Gilbeit and Zophee’s gaze turned instinctively, 
amidst the liquid dews of the morning and the golden and amber 
tint of the rising sun, stood the Chateau of Bisanos with its stone- 
pile clear drawn against the background of the sky. 

” Gilbert, Gilbert, how lovely it is!” murmured Zophee, her eyes 
sparkling with intense feeling; and t^e let him draw her along till 
they reached a bench at the far corn’er, just under the huge hotel. 
They sat down together. “How glorious it is,” she continued, 
“ Oh, why am I so happy? What is it 1 feel? 1 am so glad, so 
pleased to see you again ! And here— oh, surely this morning it is 
beautiful as a glimpse into the opening heavens!” 

“ My darling,” he whispered, “ God grant it may be mine forever 
to keep that sunny morning-light shining over life for you.” 

“Hush, hush!” she answered. “Look, Gilbert, is it not exqui- 
site? Look there, and do not think of me?” 

“But I think of you. Look round, look up at me, Zophee. 
Tell me, do you love me still? — do 3-^00 love me after twelve Jong 
months, as you let me feel you loved me, even though you drove me 
from you, that bitter day last spring?” 

“ Ah, Gilbert, do not!” she urged him. “ Ah, must I drive 3^011 
from me again? My dear friend,” she continued, earnestly, turning 
quite suddenly upon him, clasping her hands together, and fixing 
her dark, pleading eyes upon his face, “ is it not over yet— all that, 
dear friend? May we not meet? Must 1 drive you from me? Is it 
not over and forgotten yet?” 

“ Not over, and never will be over while my life lasts,” he uttered; 
“ neither forgotten nor ever to be forgotten.” 

“ Ah, thenV’ she sighed, with a sad shade falling over her face, 
“ then, dear friend, farewell. Take me in, I must go— take me in, 
Gilbert. And God bless you, dear friend, and God grant some day 
we may meet — some day — once more as really friends. Till then, 
alas! 1 can still only say to 3'ou farewell.” 

“Never,” he exclaimed then: “Zophee, while we live, I will 
never say that bitter word again to 3^011. 1 shall never leave you, 

3'^ou shall not drive me from you; for you love me, and my heart 
has been worn out with longing all these weary months for you. 
And, my darling, my own beloved,” he cried, his voice breaking 
suddenly with passionate intonation, as he wound his arms irresisti- 
bly round her and drew her to him while he spoke, “ my dear love, 
there is no one standing between us now, believe me; not the faint- 
est shadow lies across the brightness of our path. Dear, won’t you 
look at me, and see how wayworn and travel-stained 1 am? And 
think you, Zonhee, that 1 took that long, haid journey in vain?” 

“Gilbert, Gilbert, what mean you?” she cried, and her eyes 
turned upon his face again, questioning it with eager scrutiny, and 


THE SUH-MA.1D. 


m 

she diew her breath fast and strong, her heart beating Willi strange, 
wild wonder, and sick with vague and undefined tear. “ Gilbert, 
Gilbert,” she panted, “ what mean you?” 

”My love, 1 mean he stands between us no longer. You are 
mine now, as indeed you ever were, but now really and truly and 
only- -only mine. Look, look, Zophee, 1 have this to give 5 ^ 00 — see! 
I stood by him and took this from his pillow. I saved it from beiiig 
the booty of the Cossacks, and Zophee, before Heaven, 1 vow in 
sacred and solemn oath, 1 vow it, 1 saw him— die!” 

” Gilbert, Gilbert,” her voice came breaking in then upon his 
words, wistful, incredulous, full of wonder, full of strange fears 
and dismay. “ Gilbert,” and her fingers trembled violently as they 
closed round the gold-framed medallion he had placed quietly in 
her hand — “ Gilbert, speak to me; I do not seem to hear you; speak 
again. What is this? My God! tell me quickly, quickly, tell me, 
for 1 do not understand.” 

And then he told her, drawing her drooping head to rest on his 
strong shoulders as he spoke; told her of his long journeying, of his 
weary search, of his bitter failure, and of all his deep despair; and 
then of that strange night on the far-off steppes amidst the snows of 
Cis-Caucasia— of the storm and the post-house; and of the pilgrim 
who came to fall down upon the threshold of the door. Of all he 
told her — of the long, quiet watch of that weird-like night, of the 
words that had fallen from the pilgrim’s lips, or the names he had 
uttered, of the places of which he spoke; and, finally, of the break 
of that snowy morning, of the finding of the portrait, of the agony 
of his own tempted soul, of the coming of the Cossack vultures, and 
of the timely rescue by the kind, strong hand of — Death. 

And she listened, resting quietly, her hands clasped firmly in his, 
her eyes wandering sometimes away toward the golden horizon of 
the morning, but drooping often, weighed down with quick-spring- 
ing tears. 

For there was much to pain her in his long narration; much to 
call forth whispered words of pity and bitter sorrow for the fate of 
the wandering lost one, and for this last crushing blow that must 
fall yet on his father’s bruised heart. 

Over Mettrai’s miserable end, and at the thought of her beloved 
guardian, old Vododski, and of the soul-piercing bereavement that 
hud come upon him, Zophee wept softly again and again. 

And yet the happiness was intense and deep of these two, as they 
sat together, and talked low and quietly, and the morning light grew 
above their heads. And, as we leave them— with that sunshine 
flooding gloriously around them, and all the tumult and strong 
suffering that had been woven into their -life’s romance becoming 
quickly a memory and gliding into the past— the lines of a French 
writer recur to our minds, and we stop, just realizing—” Que I’amour 
aussi a son aurore, qiiand la nuit est passee, et le soleil du bonheur 
se leve; mais il est plus facile a d’ecrire ses tempetes, ses souffrances, 
et ses tumuites, que de paiier de ses jours de calme parfait.” 


THE END. 


THE SEASIDE LIBEAEY. — Pocket Edition, 

(CONTINUED FROM SECOND PAGE OF COVER.) 


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113 Mrs. Carr’s Companion. Bj' M. Wight- 

wick 10 

114 Some of Our Girls. By Mrs. Eiioart! 20 

115 Diamond Cut Diamond. By T. Adol- 

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: 117 A Tale of the Shore and Ocean. By 

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132 Master Humphrey’s Clock. By Charles 

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87 Uncle Jack. By Walter Besant 10 

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188 Idonea. By Anne Beale 20 

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190 Romance of a Black Veil. By the Au- 

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193 The Rosery Folk. By G. Manville 

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194 ” So Near and Yet So Far !” Alison ! ! 10 

195 “ The Way of the World.” By David 

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196 

197 For Her Dear Sake. Mary Cecil Hay 20 

198 A Husband’s Story. 10 

199 The Fisher Village. By Anne Beale.. 10 

200 An Old Man’s Love. Anthony Trollope 10 

201 The Monastery. By Sir Walter Scott 20 

202 The Abbot. By Sir Walter Scott 20 

203 John Bull and His Island. Max O’Rell 10 

204 Vixen. By Miss M. E. Braddon 15 

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By Charles Reade 10 


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I=0CK:E'3? EX)ITI03iT. 


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207 Pretty Miss Neville. By B. M. Croker 15 

208 The Ghost of Charlotte Cray, and 

Other Stories. Florence Marryat.. 10 

209 Alice, Grand Duchess of Hesse, Prin- 

cess of Great Britain and Ireland. 
Biographical Sketch and Letters. . 10 

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By Charles Lever (Complete in one 
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70 White Wings : A Yachting Romance. 

By William Black 10 

148 Thorns and Orange-Blossoms. By 

the Author of “ Dora Thorne ”... 10 
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190 Romance of a Black Veil. By the Au- 
thor of “ Dora Thorne ” 10 

192 At the World’s Mercy. By F. Warden 10 

195 ” The Way of the World.” By David 

Christie Murray 15 

196 Hidden Perils. By Mary Cecil Hay . . 10 

197 For Her Dear Sake. Mary Cecil Hay 20 

200 An Old Man’s Love. Anthony Trollope 10 

201 The Monastery. By Sir Walter Scott 20 


202 The Abbot. By Sir W^alter Scott 20 

203 John Bull and His Island. MaxO’Rell 10 

204 Vixen. By Miss M. E. Braddon 15 

206 The Picture, and Jack of All Trades. 

By Charles Reade 10 

165 The History of Henry Esmond. By 

William Makepeace Thackeray .. . 20 

166 Moonshine and Marguerites. By “ The 

Duchess” 10 

167 Heart and Science. By Wilkie Collins 20 

168 No Thoroughfare. By Charles Dick- 

ens and Wilkie Collins 10 

169 The Haunted Man. Charles Dickens. 10 


170 A Great Treason. By Mary Hoppus. 

171 Fortune’s Wheel, and Other Stories. 

By ” The Duchess ” 

172 ” Golden Girls.” By Alan Muir 

173 The Foreigners. By Eleanor C. Price 20 

174 Under a Ban. By Mrs. Lodge 20 

175 Love’s Random Shot, and Other Sto- 

ries. By Wilkie Collins 10 

176 An April Day. By Philippa P. Jeph- 

son 10 

177 Salem Chapel. By Mrs. Oliphant.... 20 

178 More Leaves from the Journal of a 

Life in the Highlands. By Queen 
Victoria 10 

179 Little Make-Believe. B. L. Far jeon.. 10 

180 Round the Galley Fire. By W. Clark 

Russell 10 

182 The Millionaire. A Novel 20 

183 Old Contrairy. and Other Stories. By . 

Florence Marr 5 ^at 10 

184 Thirlby Hall. By W. E. Norris 20 

185 Dita. By Lady Margaret Majendie.. 10 

186 The Canon’s Ward. By James Payn. 20 

187 The Midnight Sun. Fredrika Bremer 10 

188 Idonea. By Anne Beale 20 

189 Valerie’s Fate. By Mrs. Alexander.. 5 
191 Harry Lorrequer. By Charles Lever. 20 

193 The Rosery Folk. By G. Manville 

Fenn 10 

194 “ So Near and Yet So Far 1” Alison.. 10 

198 A Husband’s Story 10 

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